D&D 5E The Limit, The Floor, or the Average?

[commandercrud]

They're the limit. Clearly.

 

[Oofta]

Another aspect of this: what happens on failure? Does it matter how much they fail?

Assume for a moment that Bob wants to pick up unconscious Sam and carry him out of harms way. Unfortunately Bob is already close enough to their max carry capacity that picking up Sam would exceed their max carry capacity. They need to go more than 5 ft so dragging isn't going to work.

Another possibility is jumping a gap - let's say the PC has a 16 strength but the gap is 20 feet.

So how do you set the DC? What happens if they fail? Does it matter how much they fail by? For me, it depends on how much they're trying to exceed the default maximum. Over a few pounds? Jumping an extra few feet? That's a DC 5-10. Someone with a high athletics score can probably do it automatically, others are going to be taking a risk. Longer gaps? Go up from there.

Then what about failing? In general if you fail by more than 10, you fail and probably take damage or similar penalty. You tried to lift something too heavy and pulled a muscle Fail by more than 5? You sort of succeed. You get halfway carrying that heavy load before collapsing or leap far enough to grab the ledge on the other side but must pull yourself up.

Anyway, that's how I handle it. Rewards people for investing in skills while still adding the option to attempt to push beyond what they can normally accomplish.

 

[Sithlord]

I don’t measure the weight of every object or thing in the game. If it looks like something they can drag they can drag it. If it looks in the heavy side they make a strength check. And it’s something that really doesn’t come up in my game.

 

[robus]

They're the limit. Clearly.

IMO, they’re the characters limit to performing those actions without an ability check. Want to push your limit? You’re going to need to make a check and risk exhaustion or injury (lose a hit dice or something).

 

[doctorbadwolf]

The real-world human sprinter or long jumper is definitely 'taking an action' - they're not leaping the 20' pit, landing on their feet, and stabbing an orc on the far side, all at once. That's the kind of situation the rules are designed to cover.

Sure, I’ve referenced speed while dashing a couple times, for example.

 

[Oofta]

IMO, they’re the characters limit to performing those actions without an ability check. Want to push your limit? You’re going to need to make a check and risk exhaustion or injury (lose a hit dice or something).

Good point. Even if successful at the task you may risk injury or exhaustion.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Good point. Even if successful at the task you may risk injury or exhaustion.

Man I begin to see why some folks see martial characters as more limited than how I see them.

 

[Fenris-77]

I use them as rough guidelines. Anything inside the listed numbers works as advertised, but I'm happy to let PCs try to push themselves too. I generally use an exhaustion mechanic anyway, so that's in play, but sometimes I'll put other failure conditions on the line instead, depending on what makes sense in the current situation. So either a stat or skill roll with consequences of some kind.

 

[Oofta]

Man I begin to see why some folks see martial characters as more limited than how I see them.

Nah, I'm talking about that wizard who made strength their dump stat when I ask them how heavy their spellbook is now that they just gained another level.

 

[Maxperson]

When you run or play 5e, do you treat things like lift/drag/carry weight, jump height/distance, etc as the limit, the floor, the average, or something else?

My habit has been for a few years now to treat them as essentially the floor. This is what you can do without needing to roll. It is also the floor in the sense that a low roll usually won’t go below them, except in exceptional circumstances.

If you treat these numbers the same way, as the floor of a PC’s capability, do you do the same for any of the following;

• Climbing half your speed
• Movement speed while dashing
• Dark vision radius
• Anything else you can think of

Why or why not?

I treat it similarly. What the things you can do without a roll are the limits of what you can do without pushing yourself hard enough to need to roll. To me the floor is the bottom, which implies a lot of room to go up. So for a 10 strength(in pounds), carrying 1 pound would be the floor, carrying 150 pounds would be roughly 80-90%(low enough not to need a roll to achieve), and if you want to push to the limit and go above 150, you need an athletics check to gain the remainder.