Rogues automatically suceed at Hard Tasks

[Mallus]

Why should a Rogue Sage be better at Lore skills than a Wizard Sage?

Because wizards get spells and rogues don't, ie it's a class balance issue.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I'm not that wild about the range of the auto success on the rogue, but it is no worse than comparable things in the playtest, such as the dwarven poison immunity. It's not my style, but good enough as an early default in a simple playtest for "practically rarely fails at X"--if there are later options to swap it out for something else.

The real problem they are running into here is the banality of the skill as "+3 to some specific set of tasks." The rogue's auto success just makes that more obvious. The whole skill system would work better (statistically and as a reflection of tropes) if a skill gave something akin to advantage. If the rogue then got to effectively cancel out ability score negatives on trained skills, no one would blink. However, they are trying hard to keep "advantage" as a bone simple concept.

 

[ZombieRoboNinja]

I bet dc16 locks are going on clearance pretty soon

 

[PinkRose]

I'd make rogues to have +2 to skills, instead of +3.

I like this alot.

 

[Dragongrief]

Why should a Rogue Sage be better at Lore skills than a Wizard Sage? Ditto for any other class/background combination.

Define "better"

The Rogue will be more consistant (minimum roll = 10)with the basic knowledge, but a Wizard will be better with the tough questions (higher Intelligence).

If Rogues spend the points to have the same Intelligence as a Wizard, good for them. However, they'll likely be lacking in other areas.

 

[Dice4Hire]

Well, I'd love to get rid of the take ten mechanic itself. Let the rogue roll twice, or something like that, if you must, but stop making people not roll the d20.

 

[JasonZZ]

So Rogues automatically succeed at Hard Tasks they are skilled in, right?
Skill Mastery (10) + Skill Mastery or Ability (+3 or more) + Skill (+3) = 16+
Is this correct?
How do you feel about it?
Would setting a Hard DC to 17 be better?

I feel it makes them competitive with Knock and Invisibility. Maybe not Charm Person, but that's always been an overpowered spell.

 

[TrippyHippy]

Isn't it patently obvious that a Rogue is fundamentally a skills based class? It even has 'Skill Mastery' as it's central trait.

You pick a Rogue knowing it's a skill monkey, not a fighter or spell caster. How is this controversial?

In answer to the question of automatic successes, well, I've personally no problem with them at 'ordinary levels'. As a DM it's hardly difficult to set traps and the like that have a greater difficulty class if you want to increase the challenge.

 

[slobo777]

The only problem I have with take 10 mechanics is that there's a big jump between "Auto success" and "Fail more often than succeed" that this generates. There's no "Slight risk of failure" that might make the players consider their options, or at least make trade-off decisions about risk versus speed/resources used interesting.

However, you can still make auto-success situations interesting, because there's still an action cost to performing a skill. When trapped in a room, and needing to escape, should the rogue engage in battle, or investigate the door? Should the rogue spend an extra action checking for traps? Even if both those were single action and auto-success, it could still be nail-biting for the player team.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

It should start lower. Imagin if it was 6+ 1/3 level instead of 10 or mor

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