Search!

[Mark]

DMs - Please give a description of how you allow players to use the Search skill, what you describe in the basic units of time in which it is used, and what thresholds you place on how much can be acomplished by a Search skill check.

Players - Please describe how much you expect to get, information-wise, from the use of the Search skill, how often you use it, and what sort of additional information you try to give along with merely invoking the skill.

Thanks.

 

[alsih2o]

as a player i usualy try to give something, even something loose, i am searching for. "i look around the alcove for hiding places" "i search the walls for hidden doors" and assume the d.m. will give me credit for finding somethign i wasn't exactly poking around for if i get a good roll.

as a d.m. i expect the same.

i also try to include, and expect a reasonable staement of action. "i try to feel around the stones qietly" or "i am turning everything in site over and pulling on everything can grab at"

i find it helps with the story and makes skill use much more clear.

 

[Crothian]

It really depends on the situation. If there is nothing to be found I have them make a single search roll and just say they find nothing. When we have the battlemat out I have them designate the area they want to search, and then start making rolls. The larger the area the longer thetime. I don't use any hard fast rules, I fiund it's better to allow the flow of the game dictate it as it can really slow down a game.

 

[pogre]

Players can announce they are searching the room. I assume a cursory search with the PCs dividing up the area for the search. I let everybody make a search check and then roll a die equal to the number of players - that tells me who has the search roll I will check the DC against. It keeps the game moving quickly - and if PCs really need to find something - they do.

Occassionally, players will insists on their PC searching one area or this and that area.

Players may search an area more than once but I usually make them take a ten or a twenty and charge them the necessary time for it.

 

[jdavis]

Alot of times we just say we are searching a room and go from there, if we are looking for something specific we announce that, "we search the room for gold" then that is all we are searching for, we normally try to describe how we are searching, casual, looking hard, looting an area or the ever popular Mafia search (taking the place apart, like they do in the movies).

When I am DMing I normally won't give them anything unless it is important or the specifically say they are looking in that area. I like to do the rolls myself where they can't see them, that way they don't know if they roled bad or if there just wasn't anything there to find. We don't play that way as much as we used to but it was always good for a serious campaign.

 

[Piratecat]

I only allow my players who are EN World Community Supporters to search. It drives them nuts, but it provides consistency in my life.

 

[Painfully]

I used to just have them roll and tell them if they found anything, but I think everybody starts out that way.

Now I ask them what they search, and how they are searching it. Looting bodies is simple, and I just let them roll and tell them what they get. For rooms, I ask them what they are searching for and how. A person looking for traps on a desk is different than a person searching for documents in the same desk. A person looking for valuables will only look in the most obvious places, or for containers.

Normally, I have different PCs searching different parts of the room at the same time. So rather than blurt out what everyone found, I will pass notes to each player with the contents of their loot, and they can decide if they want to share that info with the other players or not (in character I hope).