D&D (2024) Should Bounded Accuracy apply to skill checks? Thoughts on an old Alexandrian article

[James Gasik]

But here's my pushback. Why CAN'T you have checks in the game that non-Expertise players just fail? Why is that bad?

There should NEVER be a skill check in the game that actively precludes the adventure from continuing. So you seed special rewards and optional paths behind very high checks, so that the character with Expertise feels the value.

Well yes, but what if no-one has Expertise? How many super high DC rolls should one seed in their game if the odds are very low that they'd be made?

 

[Pedantic]

Unless I'm reading you incorrectly (which is entirely possible I will admit)... you make it sound like your reasons for these checks are to think up ways in the fiction to generate bonus methods to "win the dice roll". That "winning the dice roll" is actually the point of playing, and not whatever it is your character is actually doing and trying to accomplish "in-game" in the world of the campaign. If your PC has to "get over a wall" within the fiction (for example), then the point of the RPG is to leverage game mechanics and think up methods within the fiction that allow you to get mechanical bonuses to win the dice roll that lets you "get over the wall". And if you "get over the wall" then you've won this encounter... not because your character now gets to see what is on the other side, but merely because you rolled higher than the DC the DM gave you.

@TwoSix explained it pretty well. It's a mistake to focus on a given die roll; I don't care if I succeed on a climb check, but if my character's goal is getting into that fortified zoo to rescue an awakened giraffe, what is the best set of actions I can declare to get that result?

Ideally, the climb check is a tool I might consider to that end, and I'll be able to put forth a plan/preference after considering my options. My choices should have an impact on what happens and how likely I am to get what I want. If I can't mechanically discriminate between options, if there isn't a functional difference between climbing the wall/bribing the guard/disguising myself as a horse, then there isn't much point in having variance in skill resolution to begin with, and as @TwoSix said, why aren't you just playing FKR or resolving things with coin flips?

The game can absolutely play the way it seems like you are advocating for... and it very much feels reflective of late '70s style gameplay (where the challenge is to the players to outwit the DM by leveraging bits of fiction)... but that style has moved on quite a ways over the last 50 years and I don't foresee "official" D&D ever going back to it. Especially not now that there are plenty of RPGs that are being designed all the time to bring that style back for the players that want it.

If only. I'm not in the OSR bucket; I'm advocating for a detailed, descriptive skill system with a bunch of specified actions that are written down in the book ahead of time for players to use. I think of the style you're describing as less about "playing a game" in the sense I mean here, and more akin to an escape room, with slightly more open-ended solutions.

 

[TwoSix]

Well yes, but what if no-one has Expertise? How many super high DC rolls should one seed in their game if the odds are very low that they'd be made?

3-4 per session is generally what I do for Tier 3 games.

 

[James Gasik]

I, personally, would have no problem giving fighters a stacking bonus to attack per tier. The high-level fighter should be an engine of destruction that hardly ever misses.

I mean, Reliable for Fighters is something I can be totally on board with. Expertise on attacks though, I can guarantee would inevitably warp the game around it.

Adventures in Rokugan is a 5e supplement that plays around with "half-Expertise", which is a lot more reasonable (though at the same time, there are ways to get "Expertise" on a saving throw, which I am on the fence about).

 

[ezo]

Because the core issue of class balance centers around this question. "The party needs X role filled. What class can best fulfill that role, as well as bring along other utility?"

I disagree.

The question should be "The party needs X roll filled. How can the classes we have best fulfill that roll, as well as bring along other utility?"

You never need a Rogue to fill a role, just like you never need a Wizard, Fighter, or Cleric, or any class to fill a particular role. Some do it better than others depending on the role, certainly, but that is where it ends.

And if the role is "Scout ahead, find and disarm traps, and open locks" the ONLY thing that would make consider a full rogue over a caster like wizard or bard is something on the level of Reliable Talent.

Again, I disagree. Most games don't even make it to tier 3 when Reliable Talent comes online (2014), but due to having more skills (4) and four expertises, Rogues can do a wide variety of taskes effectively even before then.

Bards are a whole other issue as full casters, which they should never be IMO, but even they will only have two expertises prior to 10th level, not the four a Rogue has by 6th (a more commonly played level). IMO, Bards should never have Expertise. The class should be more about the Jack-of-All-Trades, Master-of-None concept.

I would much prefer my Wizard party member or my Bard to focus on other things than have them deal the the things the Rogue can easily handle.

I'm not arguing this other classes can't do it, but given everything else, they really shouldn't be doing it.

Rogues aren't useless or unplayable or anything like that. They can carry their weight. But other than the rogue imagery, they're mostly just OK even at the core rogue tasks.

Again, I have to disagree. Rogues excel at rogue tasks, even before Reliable Talent. That might not be your experience, but as someone who plays rogues a lot and has a rogue in nearly every single party I've run or played in, that is certainly not my experience!

Whereas I remember the days of AD&D where my Thief often failed his stealth rolls because AD&D did not actually want you to succeed. The percentages started too low and there were so many penalties that you could not even do your class function until you were at a level that magic had supplanted you anyway. I would rather a rogue be a little too good at their job than be a useless waste of rations for the majority of their career.

AD&D is a differnt beast. Let's not move goalposts, ok? Thanks.

In 5E, a 1st level Rogue with Expertise in Stealth is +7 or +8. Most passive Perceptions are 10-12 at that level. Meaning you can sneak by them 80% of the time or so.

 

[Remathilis]

Also. If the Rogue's raison d'etre is to be super good at skill checks, why doesn't the Fighter get to double their proficiency bonus with attack rolls? Seems to me that the same logic would apply.

But we know why it doesn't, because then people would look at any other class that isn't Fighter and say "welp, they obviously can't succeed in combat, look at this massive bonus they don't have!". And everyone who makes attack rolls would either be a Fighter or have a Fighter dip to whatever level is required to get that bonus!

Now obviously, there are vanishingly few enemies with AC's beyond 20, because there is no "expertise for attack" or even "reliable for attack" (my goodness, could you imagine the hair pulling if Fighters could never miss?!).

But if those things existed, would we have people saying "you can't take that away from Fighters, it's the only thing they got going for them in a world of magic!".

And would we have theory crafting to say that "by Tier 4, if you don't have Fighters in your party, you might as well stop playing, because once enemies start having AC of 25+, the chances of you hitting without constant and massive buffs becomes vanishingly small"?

Just a thought.

The Rogue gets expertise in four skills over its career. So does the bard. The ranger gets three. The wizard gets it in one Intelligence skill. Anyone can get it in one skill of choice at fourth level with Skill Expert. Expertise is painfully easy to get. Much like weapon mastery, it's never more than one feat or one level dip away.

 

[TwoSix]

I mean, Reliable for Fighters is something I can be totally on board with. Expertise on attacks though, I can guarantee would inevitably warp the game around it.

Adventures in Rokugan is a 5e supplement that plays around with "half-Expertise", which is a lot more reasonable (though at the same time, there are ways to get "Expertise" on a saving throw, which I am on the fence about).

I would have to see what "warping" entails to decide whether it's a bad thing or not.

 

[James Gasik]

3-4 per session is generally what I do for Tier 3 games.

Wow. Even for groups without Expertise? How do your players react to these sorts of checks being common? Have they optimized to be able to make them or do they just get creative and circumvent them?

Honestly curious here!

 

[TiQuinn]

Also, um, what level 20 Rogue doesn't have a 20 Dex or higher? You say the floor is 22, but isn't 27 more realistic?

The game changes dramatically once you hit Tier 3. Planning around where characters should be at by Tier 4 isn’t really the driver for me because there’s few campaigns that get there, few published adventures supporting that level of play, and not even a great sense that WotC balances or playtests the game up to that level anyways. Fighters for example are hitting their target ACs the majority of the time at those high levels too.

 

[Pedantic]

Well yes, but what if no-one has Expertise? How many super high DC rolls should one seed in their game if the odds are very low that they'd be made?

Imagine if DCs weren't something you, the GM, put down like locks/roadblocks and instead were the percentage chance of activation for specific player abilities. We generally don't consider parties without access to specific spells unable to engage.