D&D General Should players be aware of their own high and low rolls?

[overgeeked]

I'm not house ruling or severely restricting anything where this discussion is concerned, and yes, we have discussed this before. In that discussion, and all similar discussions in which I have participated, I've shown with specificity all the trade-offs those things bring with them which the rules themselves lay out and from which logical, genre-appropriate repercussions can ensue.

None of which are about time, which is the current bugbear.

The rule you're quoting actually helps mitigate the thing you seem to care about by resolving tasks in a way where "metagaming" (as you define and present it) doesn't work.

What rule am I quoting?

Remember, in almost all cases, the DM is the one who sets the stage for "metagaming" to happen. To then demand the players not engage with the "metagaming" opportunity the DM has presented seems rather like creating the PCs sick and commanding them to be well.

So the referee doesn’t set the stage in a way that allows metagaming. Rolling behind the screen for things the PCs can’t possibly know, for example. Problem solved.

It’s refreshing to see you think the players haven’t enough self control to simply not metagame. At least we agree on that.

 

[Lanefan]

So should there be more situations where players aren’t clued in to their own rolls for more natural reactions? What are your thoughts?

Yes.

Any time the character doesn't or can't know the result or outcome of an action, the player shouldn't either; and thus the dice should be rolled in secret by the DM.

Flip side: whenever the result is obvious to the character it should also immediately be made obvious to the player.

Flip flip side: sometimes the "obvious" result need not be the actual one. In your persuade-the-guard example, the obvious result might be the guard cheerfully waves you all through but the actual result is that she's about to alert her Thieving buddies that some fine marks just went up the Queen's Walk toward Heratos Plaza...

And note I specifically say "player" in the singular here. Even if the result of something is obvious to one character it might not be to all, and thus it's on the player in-character to say in their own words what happened.

 

[iserith]

None of which are about time, which is the current bugbear.

They are tied to time in certain ways. But I'm not the one who introduced those things to this conversation anyway. Rather it seems you're just bringing up your grievances with D&D 5e again.

What rule am I quoting?

The bit you quoted was my reference to "progress combined with a setback" which is a rule you can use to adjudicate a failed ability check.

So the referee doesn’t set the stage in a way that allows metagaming. Rolling behind the screen for things the PCs can’t possibly know, for example. Problem solved.

It’s refreshing to see you think the players haven’t enough self control to simply not metagame. At least we agree on that.

I make no judgment on a player's self-control in this regard because it doesn't matter to me one way or another if they "metagame" or not. It's a risk for them to do it and that's their choice. It doesn't affect my game experience in any way. Caring about how a player arrives at a decision for their character is pointless in my view, and none of my business.

But as for rolling behind the screen, the only reason you would need to do that is to fix the problem you created in the first place which largely has to do with nothing happening on a failed check. It's a kludge. By applying the rules I mention above, you can leave the dice in the hands of the players and trust them to play their characters as they see fit.

 

[overgeeked]

If the outcome is certain, there shouldn’t be a roll in the first place.

Agreed.

But they should have some idea of what’s at stake and how likely they are to succeed, just as the character would.

What’s at stake is almost always obvious from diegetic sources. You are sneaking, someone might spot you. You are lying, someone might find out. Etc. The character would have “some idea,” not down to the percentage chance of success.

Personally I don’t have any interest in judging the “authenticity” of anyone’s roleplaying.

I only care because I’m tired of players treating RPGs like a video game. Why are you here if you don’t want to roleplay? This isn’t boardgame night. We’re not on a WoW server.

I’m not convinced there are any such moments.

And you likely won’t be. I don’t think there are any moments where the character would have perfect knowledge.

Simply knowing the DC and stakes is not perfect information, because you don’t know what the result of the d20 roll will be.

You know precisely what your odds are. That’s in no way realistic.

Just like with traps, if they’re looking for secret doors in the first place, they should already know there’s a secret door to be found, because they’ve picked up on something in the description of the environment that indicates it.

That’s how you run things. It’s not how I run things. Obvious traps are obvious. Hidden traps are hidden.

 

[Lanefan]

This. I think the player should always know the difficulty and the stakes before going into a roll, and they should always know if they succeeded or failed. This has several benefits: first, it allows players to act with confidence, which helps curtail waffling. Second, it can help a DM who may instinctively want to call for a roll simply because an action has been declared to stop and think through what the difficulty and stakes of the action are - if you can’t think of what to tell the player will happen on a failure, or if you think the DC should be really low, it’s probably not worth calling for a roll at all. Thirdly, it helps eliminate mismatched expectations - when a player thinks something is going to be easy and/or have low stakes but the DM thinks it’s going to be more difficult and/or have higher stakes, simply stating the difficulty and stakes out loud can avoid unpleasant surprises. This also feeds back into the first benefit, allowing players to act more confidently without fear of secret “gotchas.”

That's just it, though: secret "gotchas" should always be a fear, even if they end up being rare in practice.

It's extremely rare that a character wold ever be operating with full and complete information about any given situation - same as in real life. In the hgiher-stakes world of adventuring, however, that lack of info can come back to bite you real hard sometimes.

Usually the counter-argument is that “the player shouldn’t know things the character couldn’t know,” and to folks who care about such things, I say, stating the DC and consequences represents the character’s ability to assess a difficult task and make a prediction about their own capability of succeeding at it. That’s something the character should be able to do to a reasonable degree of accuracy, and DM description alone can easily fail to convey that information. Granted, it should also be possible for the character to make an incorrect assessment, and that is one of the factors that is covered by the random nature of the die roll. And, the player seeing the result of their roll represents the character’s after-the-fact assessment of their own performance, again something the character should know. An argument can be made that there are some edge cases where a character shouldn’t be able to make an accurate assessment of their performance. I think such cases should be few and far between, so it may be acceptable to roll secretly in such cases, but I still think the benefits of keeping that information in the open significantly outweigh the drawbacks. If for some reason I felt it was really important that the roll be kept secret, I would use a passive check, as advised in the PHB. But I struggle to imagine a scenario where I would feel that was necessary.

One follows from the other here, as the scenarios that most often call for secret checks are the ones where something the character doesn't know about might impact them negatively, i.e. a gotcha.

Never mind that being told the numbers and odds completely breaks immersion for me.

 

[Lanefan]

This is a common go-to example, but in my experience it doesn’t actually come up. If a player is actively searching for traps in my game, they almost certainly already know there’s a trap to find. This is because I telegraph the presence of traps because I want players to interact with them.

Then it's not much of a trap, is it? The whole point of a trap is, ideally, to catch people unawares and - wait for it - trap them! Proactively telegraphing traps greatly defeats this purpose.

I want players to interact with traps, yes; but I don't necessarily want them to be able to control how and when that interaction occurs. Players, on the other hand, don't want to interact with traps, and thus take steps e.g. searching, moving cautiously, etc. to avoid them.

 

[overgeeked]

They are tied to time in certain ways. But I'm not the one who introduced those things to this conversation anyway.

They are the standard way people track time and make it matter.

The bit you quoted was my reference to "progress combined with a setback" which is a rule you can use to adjudicate a failed ability check.

So I “quoted a rule” means I quoted you referencing a rule. Got it.

I make no judgment on a player's self-control in this regard because it doesn't matter to me one way or another if they "metagame" or not. It's a risk for them to do it and that's their choice.

You keep saying that but have yet to explain it. How do you mean it’s a risk beyond homebrewed or reskinned monsters?

It doesn't affect my game experience in any way.

It does mine. Maybe I’m weird in that I want players to actually roleplay and not play RPGs as if they were a boardgame or video game.

But as for rolling behind the screen, the only reason you would need to do that is to fix the problem you created in the first place…

LOL. The players metagaming is my fault. Right.

 

[Charlaquin]

What’s at stake is almost always obvious from diegetic sources. You are sneaking, someone might spot you. You are lying, someone might find out. Etc. The character would have “some idea,” not down to the percentage chance of success.

Right, so there should be nothing to lose by stating it non-digetcally, except the risk that a player may misunderstand the diegetic messaging.

I only care because I’m tired of players treating RPGs like a video game. Why are you bere if you don’t want to roleplay? This isn’t boardgame night. We’re not on a WoW server.

Telling players the stakes and odds does not preclude roleplaying.

You know precisely what your odds are. That’s in no way realistic.

Very, very little in D&D is in any way realistic. It’s all abstract representation. Knowing the precise odds is a pretty decent abstract representation of the character’s understanding of their own capabilities and direct perception of the environment.

That’s how you run things. It’s not how I run things. Obvious traps are obvious. Hidden traps are hidden.

And the way I run things has many benefits, which I have innumerated. On the other hand, the impression I get from your posts is that running things the way you do has lead to a great deal of frustration.

 

[Lanefan]

If the outcome is certain, there shouldn’t be a roll in the first place.

This is a very key thing here.

There should be a roll regardless, because while you-as-DM know the outcome is certain the player/PC does not.

Example: PC is sneaking across the grounds of a manor house, scouting a possible means of entrance for the party. You-as-DM know there's no opposition present at the time and that the place is deserted, but the PC (and thus player) does not. So, I'll roll anyway (stealth rolls are secret) and narrate the results e.g. "You're real quiet crossing the grounds - what now?" or "That turned out quite a bit noisier than you'd like - what next?", as even though in fact there's nothing there, those results might affect their next action and-or how long it takes.

The nature of the dice roll insures that the player will not be certain of the outcome. But they should have some idea of what’s at stake and how likely they are to succeed, just as the character would.

Except as noted above there's often going to be times when they simply don't and can't know what's at stake, if anything.

Simply knowing the DC and stakes is not perfect information, because you don’t know what the result of the d20 roll will be.

It's perfect information, however, in deciding whether to make that roll or to bail out. Or do you only tell the DC once the player has committed to the roll and can't back out?

Just like with traps, if they’re looking for secret doors in the first place, they should already know there’s a secret door to be found,

Why? What stops them from looking just for the hell of it, or because they've imagined something that isn't really there?

because they’ve picked up on something in the description of the environment that indicates it. If they mistakenly think they’ve picked up on something, no need to roll due to no chance of success. They just spend the necessary amount of time and fail to find anything.

Here's the metagame bit, though: by not rolling you've just outright told them there's nothing to be found there, when in the fiction they wouldn't and couldn't know that for sure.

 

[Stormonu]

No, he believes he fails because of the action the guard take next, and chooses to act on that belief. He could have waited to see what the guard did before prompting the wizard to cast charm person, and if he had waited, he would have learned he did succeed.

Allowing the 3 of the die roll to indicate he failed creates the metagaming the OP describes. This removes that. It makes it so middle-ground rolls with good bonuses leads to the PC learning the most regardless of my roll.

The DC was 10 in the example. Suppose the PC rolled an 10, with a +5 bonus would be 15. Now, if I reverse the 8 due to my roll to a 11, with +5 still beats the DC. So, the PC can be pretty certain he fooled the guard, since either way he would beat a DC 15 even!


Good thing you aren't, then.

This is "roll behind the screen", with extra steps.