Scent, Spot, Listen, Blindsight....as skill checks?

[Nail]

Hello All:

Our group has been playing for about a year, and occasionally (very occasionally), the scent special ability has come up. I've read over the core rules, tried them, and decided (arbitrarily, claim the players! ) to call it a type of Spot check.

So, to see if an animal has "caught the scent", I'd roll a d20, add the animal's Spot bonus, and add a circumstance bonus from +4 to +8 (depending on smelliness of the target).

My players claim:

• #1) "If yer gonna play it that way, right it down so we know what it is!", and
• #2) "That's a total nerf! Besides, the scent ability is not unbalanced or difficult. Why change it?"

The first demand, as you may well imagine, is completely unreasonable, and I'll say no more about it.

<EDIT>This was meant to be humorous, to poke fun at the fact that of course I should have written it down, and I (the DM) should not change rules without talking to my players about it.

Unfortunately, my statement above just got my players mad, rather than providing further humor. Everyone else should take a lesson from this: yer writing ain't as clever as you think it is. </EDIT>

The second point, however, is more interesting. What does everyone else think?

I think that all of these "special sense" abilities should be rolled into a skill check, just as normal vision is rolled into Spot, and hearing is what the Listen skill is all about. Reason: why does things like Scent and Blindsight get to be automatic, whereas seeing (Spot) and hearing (Listen), is not?

.....so: Is it a good idea to have skill checks for Blindsight? For Scent? For Temorsense?

What would be best? It could be a Spot roll, a new skill roll, or combine everything into a "Sense" skill roll.

Or maybe the whole mess should be left alone.....

Comments?

 

[Planesdragon]

What would be best? It could be a Spot roll, a new skill roll, or combine everything into a "Sense" skill roll.

IMC, I'm going to formally change "Spot" and "Listen" to "Awareness" and "Altertness." The first allows you to notice details in the area around you, the second lets you notice changes in the area around you.

Hide will remain as is (and be oppsed by Awareness), while "Move Silently" will change to "Sneak", and be opposed by Alertness.

 

[Silveras]

I think you are making a bigger to-do about it than you need to.

Scent does not let you pinpoint the source of an odor until you are within 5 ft., for example.

The other sensory special abilities are there to augment the normal ones. Most of them, in fact, specifically say that a Spot or Listen check is NOT made (which also implies that you would NOT made some other "sense" check, either).

It is, of course, your game, and you are free to do as you wish. However, I strongly disagree with you about writing it up. If you insist on changing the ground rules under which the game is played, you should put it in writing and share it with everyone.

 

[DrSpunj]

The first demand, as you may well imagine, is completely unreasonable, and I'll say no more about it.

It is, of course, your game, and you are free to do as you wish. However, I strongly disagree with you about writing it up. If you insist on changing the ground rules under which the game is played, you should put it in writing and share it with everyone.

Since I'm being "unreasonable", I'll refrain from posting any further thoughts.

EDIT: Actually, Nail, I didn't take true offense at your original statement, BUT ONLY BECAUSE I KNOW YOU! Even reading through it a second time after seeing the Smileys wasn't really enough to change the tone of the original statement the way it was written. I think the only way you could've pulled off what you were trying to do is by labeling it up front like this: [sarcasm]statement[/sarcasm].

DrSpunj

 

[Nifft]

IMC, "Scent" grants a +4 bonus to "detection" rolls -- Spot, Listen, Survival (tracking), Search (for something with a scent).

I've been thinking for a while about merging Hide/Move Silently into "Sneak" and Spot/Listen into "Awareness", then giving various critters bonuses and/or penalties for specific modalities -- Hawks get a bonus to spot checks, which are visual Awareness checks.

Alertness and Stealthy would go away, replaced by Skill Focus (Awareness or Sneak).

I just need to make rules for specific modalities...

-- N

 

[Tonguez]

I've kept Spot - as it is used to pinpoint and identify target objects

but Listen is now Perception and includes all of Listen, Scent, Tremorsense and Blindsightie things which are percieved by the senses other than sight

 

[Nail]

Since I'm being "unreasonable", I'll refrain from posting any further thoughts.

Aack!

No, no, no! That was scarcasm! A joke! Note the smily face, followed by the blushing! Of course I should write it down! Heck, I should have just gone with the book until we, the group, discussed it!!!! My Bad!


Arrrgggggg!!!!!

Crap. Just *issed off a player with a poor attempt at humor. Please accept my apology.

And, obviously, others didn't get the sarcasm too, so I must have really missed my Clever Writing skill roll. Blast.

 

[Nail]

Scent does not let you pinpoint the source of an odor until you are within 5 ft., for example.

True enough. But it also allows you the ability to do so automatically, which is my point. It's clear that:

• the game designers constructed scent to be a secondary ability,
• didn't want the ability have a separate skill, and
• built it to speed up game play.

All of which are good ideas.

Then they built blindsight to deal with "everything else". It's not a separate skill, and it works automatically, unlike vision. ....Wait a minute: vision doesn't work automatically? Why not?

Neither does hearing. You don't automatically hear everything within a certain radius. Why not?

 

[Coredump]

Nail, *I* understood it to be humorous, and at the risk of making knee-jerk reactions based on little knowledge... I would say your player is a wee bit thin skinned.

Write it down if it is worth it to you, otherwise, have them deal with it. It isn't like 'real life' has numbers that tell you what is going on. Why should the characters have everything provided in a matrix....??

I think Spot/Listen happens much more often, so they have more detailed rules. If scent/blindsight is rare, then just wing it, or let it work RAW. But you are right, to be consistent, it should have a skill check like the rest of the sensory traits.

And the need for the players to "know exactly how it works" is pretty silly, since *you* dictate what the DC is anyway....

Good Luck,

 

[Nail]

IMC, I'm going to formally change "Spot" and "Listen" to "Awareness" and "Altertness." The first allows you to notice details in the area around you, the second lets you notice changes in the area around you.

But what about creatures that have varying abilities in several of the "senses". Does a blindsight-ing creature spot things better in daylight, even if it's blind? Etc.