If no lock can be unlocked silently then success or failure doesn't matter. Seems like success would be noisier because you were successful at getting things to move around. But it's still adding to the fiction some result just to justify your decision to add a complication. Just like the example I quoted added the cook. You might as well add that on a failure the character accidentally knocked over a flower pot which crashed to the ground, it's just as logical.
Everything you do adds to the fiction. Narrating that the kitchen is completely empty of people adds to the fiction.
If you succeed on the lockpicking, then you managed to do so without complications. If there is a cook, they didn't hear you. It doesn't necessarily mean that you made no noise--maybe you, accidentally or on purpose, timed your clicks to coincide with the kitchen's regular noises. I would consider that to be a mark of a successful lockpicking.
I just don't see a reason for the GM to force the "excitement". If they can't get the door open they likely had other options and decided the door was the safest. Now they have to consider other options.
If you don't want excitement, why even go through the whole heist to begin with? Why not just elide it like how long periods of travel is often elided? Why not just go "OK. You break into the house and steal the ruby and get out again. What do you want to do next?
I sincerely doubt the character would ever hope to be noticed unless it was part of a scam.
Seriously? You can't imagine that the PCs don't want to be noticed? That they might want to put off discovery as long as possible?
So it's my issue that you won't provide a better example?
Due to long-term medical issues, I have memory problems. I don't/can't record my sessions. And since we have a rota of GMs, it's been a while since I've been in the chair. And I have been running games other than D&D. If you want an example, you're going to have to give me a prompt.
Off the top of my head? Based on a session I had except I added a failure or two
- There's a special event by invite only. There are guards at the gate and the characters fail to convince the guards to let them in.
- They get into the event. They're trying to get into a back room which they believe has secret documents. There are rumors that there's a secret servant's passage so they can sneak back to it without attracting attention but they can't find it.
- They manage to get into the room and there is indeed a secret document but it's encoded and they can't interpret it. They can't take the document with them because the enemy will just change their plan if the document is missing. They only have a few moments before being discovered so they can't copy the entire document.
- The characters are trying to leave the event without being noticed but failed their stealth or deception checks (players chose which one to try). One of the guests recognizes them and is about to raise the alarm. The characters want to avoid a fight if at all possible but it seems inevitable.
What happens?
Some success-with-consequences possibilities:
For #1: They aroused the guards suspicion, so:
A guard tails them. So when they actually do go into the event, there's someone watching them. The PCs can possibly learn they're being tailed and will have to figure out how to ditch the tail.
Or the guard notifies the person running the event. How they react depends on knowing their personality, which I don't.
Or they see someone whose invitation is sticking out of a pocket or purse, ripe for the picking.
For #2: OK. There's still ways around.
For #3: Wow. You have a problem with the "quantum cook" because it's the GM making stuff up, but here the players have to hope you'll say they managed to copy something useful.
Was there a way they could have had enough time to copy the entire document? If so, but due to failures they only got a few moments, this is a
perfect example of fail forward/success with consequences.
If you had
planned it so that they could only copy part of it, that no matter what they did they'd only have enough time to copy part of it, that's awful railroady.
For #4: No other way to escape? No windows they can jump from, for instance? Combat is required?
In other cases it's much simpler and the number of examples are as numerous as there are skills. You have knowledge check such as history or religion. Physical checks from athletics or acrobatics to stealth or sleight of hand to open a lock. If any of those things fail I feel no need to do anything other than tell them that it didn't work.
You don't consider giving out partial information on a failed knowledge check? Just nothing at all? I mean, I do research all the time, and on a failed googlemancy check I usually get
something, just not as much as I want, or not written in a way that's as useful as it could be.