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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ahnehnois" data-source="post: 6306986" data-attributes="member: 17106">Gee, I would have said the complete opposite on all of those points. I saw in 3e an attempt to model out of combat capabilities in a much more detailed and naturalistic way than NWPs. I saw arbitrary restrictions lifted (like race/class restrictions, and indeed 3e's multiclassing system is far more realistic than the predetermined character paths that came before it). I saw detail piled on to environment rules and similar minutiae.Conversely, in PF I see incremental steps towards simplifying things or towards dissociating them; not futher steps towards reality at all.HP are definitely not the model for realism in any version of D&D, I'd agree.That's not what I'm suggesting, though. That is, I'm not saying a foraging ranger should roll every attack against a minor forest creature he's hunting. I'm saying that, in theory, said attack exists. If the creature died, it's because someone rolled attacks, hit its AC, and removed all its hit points, because that's how things work.Whether we actually play that out "onscreen" as it were is an entirely different matter. I'd say that a lot of that stuff is checks that we don't bother rolling. It's in that category of rolling a Dex check to tie your shoes: you could, but why bother? Nor do I as a DM play out all the battles that have occurred in the world before the campaign started, even though I assume that they happened and that all the rules were engaged in determining their outcomes. In fact, I'd argue the appropriate resolution is for the DM to dictate the results of the hunting, with everyone understanding that the combat mechanics were in play if we really wanted to use them.The part that is problematic to me is not the idea of forgoing the attacks, but of substituting a skill check for them. After all, if I can roll a Survival check to hunt for a deer and come back, why can't a roll a higher DC and bag a dragon? Or a human? The solution in my mind is that the skill check can't directly cause the outcome of some creature being dead. There are a variety of indirect mechanisms that could cause this outcome of course, but those weren't evident to me in the example under discussion.</blockquote>

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