D&D 5E Professions in 5e

[Fenris-77]

@wingsandsword - There are still a lot of 3.X fans here, myself included. There's nothing wrong with being honest about pros and cons of the editions though. I'm very much in your boat, I didn't play 4E at all, and then came back with 5E. Like you, I enjoy the fiddly bits of 3.X, and I'm not 'hostile' to them. That said, I have played a lot of games that have a high 'fiddly bit' quotient, and I found 5E to be a breath of fresh air in that regard. I like using backgrounds and broader skills to define character knowledge sets - I find it actually more descriptive in some ways because a character doesn't need to be expressed in terms of a long list of specific skills, but rather as a broad group of competencies. In both editions there are going to be cases where an action doesn't exactly fit, or seems outside a skill or whatever. I find it far easier to adjudicate those cases in 5E. I also find that player expectations are far different because there's less focus on trying to find a use for your best sets of bonuses and trying to shoehorn an action into one skill rather than another based on bonuses. That still happens in 5E of course, but not to the same extent.

 

[TwoSix]

I'm coming into 5e with the mindset of a 3.5 fan, someone who posted very regularly on ENWorld from circa 2003 to 2008 or so and was a huge 3.x fan (and d20 system in general). . .and hasn't been a part of the online gaming community and is getting some rather intense culture shock of seeing a place that used to love 3.x and love the intricate "fiddly bits" of gaming somehow become hostile to it. This is the shock of someone who would have been a "typical" ENWorld poster with pretty typical, mainstream attitudes towards D&D and game design about 15 years ago waking up to see what has become of D&D.

People change. I was a hardcore simulationist/3.X fan in 2005, I would have had the exact same reaction you're having now if I was introduced to the ideas then. I was initially down on 4E for many of the same reasons you state, but then I got exposed to ideas like Fortune-in-the-Middle, and narrative based games, and I realized simulationism wasn't really where I was at as a gamer anymore.

Basically, the last 12 years of reading this forum have taught me to relax my aesthetic preferences, realize that every game has its own flavor and techniques of playing, and that it's more fun to embrace a game for what it is rather than try to make it something I think it should be.

 

[Parmandur]

I think it's because the people who got irate about 4e not having a profession skill (among it's MANY other shortcomings, of which that was only a very small one), generally got off the edition treadmill with 4e because we were generally happy with 3.5 and didn't need a new edition.

That's what I did. That's what most of my gaming friends did.

This entire thread is because I decided to take a look at 5e, my first time seriously looking at the current D&D offerings since about 2008. I'm seeing it with "fresh" eyes of someone who didn't spent years playing 4e and wasn't around for the switchover from 4e to 5e either.

I'm coming into 5e with the mindset of a 3.5 fan, someone who posted very regularly on ENWorld from circa 2003 to 2008 or so and was a huge 3.x fan (and d20 system in general). . .and hasn't been a part of the online gaming community and is getting some rather intense culture shock of seeing a place that used to love 3.x and love the intricate "fiddly bits" of gaming somehow become hostile to it. This is the shock of someone who would have been a "typical" ENWorld poster with pretty typical, mainstream attitudes towards D&D and game design about 15 years ago waking up to see what has become of D&D.

I'm in the same boat, except 3.x was the only edition I ever played until I walked away from the scene with 4E. 5E has been a personal revelation.

 

[SkidAce]

OK, a few problems with this example: 22DC don't exist, they go in 5s....

Could you clarify this? I understand they go in fives in the examples of setting difficulty, but I dd not think they were set in stone.

We have been using 12s and 13s for tasks that fall "in between the lines" as it were since the beginning, so I am curious as to your thoughts on the reasons and perhaps the benefits of going by 5s.

 

[Fenris-77]

Could you clarify this? I understand they go in fives in the examples of setting difficulty, but I dd not think they were set in stone.

We have been using 12s and 13s for tasks that fall "in between the lines" as it were since the beginning, so I am curious as to your thoughts on the reasons and perhaps the benefits of going by 5s.

Well, for me anyway, 5's are easy, and the interval is big enough to make a difference. I have no issue setting DCs in between if I think it's appropriate though. I don't want to spend a lot of time aghonizing over exact DCs though, generally speaking. Medium, Hard, Really Hard, and Holy Crap (15/20/25/30) usually get the job done for me.

 

[iserith]

The DMG just suggest that if you only ever go with a DC of 10, 15, or 20, your game will work fine (and that's what I usually do unless there's a contest), I don't know of any specific rule that prohibits DCs that aren't in multiples of five.

 

[Hriston]

Okay, as I'm trying to learn 5e, and coming from a 2e and 3e heritage, I'm seeing a HUGE gap as I read through the Player's Handbook.

Are there no skills/proficiencies at all for a character to know a profession?

Yes, there are. They're the ones granted by your background. For example, as a character with the Soldier background, you have proficiency in Athletics and Intimidation, and with a gaming set and land vehicles. This lets you add your proficiency bonus to any ability checks for which the DM might call to determine whether you're successful in any tasks you attempt that are related to those proficiencies.

There is the short list of very broad skills for characters, and craft skills (and many thieving skills) seem to fall under proficiency with the tools of that trade. . but what about professions that aren't centered around a toolkit?

Backgrounds that don't include proficiency in a toolset grant proficiency in two languages instead, which is considered equivalent to two toolsets.

For example. . .

If a player or DM wanted a PC or NPC to be proficient with soldiering, to know how to function as a professional soldier, to know drill and ceremony, military procedure and bureaucracy, they had options in previous editions.

In 1st and 2nd edition, they could have a Soldiering Non-Weapon Proficiency or a Soldier Secondary Skill.

In 3rd/3.5 edition, that would fall under the Profession (Soldier) skill.

4th edition didn't have Profession skills because WotC infamously said they "weren't fun" and that any games using them weren't fun. That sort of attitude was on the long list of reasons I ignored 4e.

. . .but I'm looking at 5e and trying to see how this would have any sort of profession related skill. The closest I can see for my example is the Soldier background, but that doesn't give any special proficiency on any skills related to soldiering, and there's no way to gain anything like this after beginning the game. There's the training option for languages and tools, but that wouldn't cover a profession.

It seems like a gaping hole in the skills system. So, is there an option I'm overlooking? Is there some rule I'm missing?

Yes, it's the entire background, which includes not only four proficiencies but also a background feature. I'm not sure how you think the proficiencies granted by the Soldier background don't relate to soldiering. Athletics relates to basic combat training and physical conditioning. Intimidation relates to being trained in projecting confidence and a commanding presence. Land vehicles relates to involvement with logistics. And your chosen gaming set relates to how you spent your time with your fellow soldiers. But I think what you're really looking for is in the background feature, which for the Soldier background is called Military Rank. It allows the player to invoke and draw upon connections to an NPC military organization to gain influence, resources, etc., conditioned upon the DM's agreement that the feature applies to the situation, of course.

 

[Parmandur]

Could you clarify this? I understand they go in fives in the examples of setting difficulty, but I dd not think they were set in stone.

We have been using 12s and 13s for tasks that fall "in between the lines" as it were since the beginning, so I am curious as to your thoughts on the reasons and perhaps the benefits of going by 5s.

Well, true, it doesn't break anything to go beyond the list, and contests and Spell DCs will be more granular, as pointed out. But the RAW suggestion for Skill checks on the DMG is to only use that table to adjudicate on the fly based on the Very Easy-Impossible scale.

This does have the advantage of setting up Skill checks that exclude Incompetent Joe (who for an incompetent is super buff for some reason).

 

[prabe]

I think it's because the people who got irate about 4e not having a profession skill (among it's MANY other shortcomings, of which that was only a very small one), generally got off the edition treadmill with 4e because we were generally happy with 3.5 and didn't need a new edition.

That's what I did. That's what most of my gaming friends did.

This entire thread is because I decided to take a look at 5e, my first time seriously looking at the current D&D offerings since about 2008. I'm seeing it with "fresh" eyes of someone who didn't spent years playing 4e and wasn't around for the switchover from 4e to 5e either.

I'm coming into 5e with the mindset of a 3.5 fan, someone who posted very regularly on ENWorld from circa 2003 to 2008 or so and was a huge 3.x fan (and d20 system in general). . .and hasn't been a part of the online gaming community and is getting some rather intense culture shock of seeing a place that used to love 3.x and love the intricate "fiddly bits" of gaming somehow become hostile to it. This is the shock of someone who would have been a "typical" ENWorld poster with pretty typical, mainstream attitudes towards D&D and game design about 15 years ago waking up to see what has become of D&D.

Like @Fenris-77 I'm in a similar position, at least as to having played a lot of 3.x, skipping 4E, then jumping into 5E. There were some things that wrong-footed me about 5E at first, but it fell into place pretty quickly, but it's possible that my time playing and running Fate helped me figure out some of the stuff going on in and around Backgrounds in 5E. Also, I've never been afraid to tinker in the rules, and 5E has a lot of space in which to tinker.

 

[Fenris-77]

That's interesting. I found my experiences with FATE and PbtA very helpful as well. Oddly, not in any overt mechanical way, but yeah, in putting the background stuff into motion. I kinda wish they'd made this a little bit more front facing. It's like they wanted to use some new ideas, but didn't want to admit it, or admit any influence from other systems. I also really appreciate the tinkering space.