D&D 5E Tracking without "tracking" feature, tripping without "trip"

[Zaruthustran]

Curious how y'all handle attempts to track by characters that lack the ranger's "tracking" feature. Or attempts to trip by creatures without the fighter's "trip" feature.

My concern is that DMs, particularly novice DMs, will not allow those activities if the character lacks those specific class features. I call it the Tarkin Effect, where the more the rules define, the more they squeeze out creative interaction with the game.

Me, I'd allow tracking if the character had the Guide, Bounty Hunter, or similar background. Maybe with a Int or Wis check (search or perception) to determine efficiency. Trip would simply be an opposed Str or Dex check against target's choice of Str or Dex, as either an attack or an action.

Curious how others would rule.

 

[Kinak]

The tracking feature, thankfully, is easy enough to step down. You can just have the non-ranger make a check in that case, as you're suggesting.

There are actually Knock Down rules, much like you describe, on page 18 of the How to Play document.

I call it the Tarkin Effect, where the more the rules define, the more they squeeze out creative interaction with the game.

That's an excellent name.

I've found that, even as an experienced GM, it causes some problems. For example, letting the PC get a free intimidate check when downing a foe steps on the toes of a feat in Pathfinder. But it's also really appropriate a lot of the time.

And, frankly, once people have the mechanical permission to do what they want, there's a lot less incentive to sell it through acting. Which is certainly fine for some game styles, but makes me sad.

Cheers!
Kinak

 

[Falling Icicle]

Rangers shouldn't be the only ones that can track. I think Tracking should just be a Wisdom (Survival) check, and Rangers should get the Survival skill for free. After all, it's hard to imagine a ranger without it.

 

[pming]

Hiya.

I think all skills should be minimally described. I also think that the ability score for a skill should be known to be "most commonly used stat", with a specific mention that the DM may ask for a different stat to be used if more appropriate (e.g., subbing Int for a skill that normally defaults to Str when dealing with 'how much you know' about it rather than using it).

Skills should *never* say anything like "This skill does not allow...", or "Only people with this skill may...". I'm fine with "This skill normally does not allow...", or "People with this skill are better at...".

As for experience I've found skills with less distinctions make players think more creatively in their skill use. I have players saying stuff like "I try and open the door with the least amount of noise...I have Carpentry, would that help?", or maybe "Can I tell if the guy is very nimble or not based on his clothes, weight balance of items and stuff like musculature? I have Acrobatics..."? Basically, I find it helps players think outside the box.

^_^

Paul L. Ming

 

[Li Shenron]

I would really, really want the math behind to make untrained checks possible but not worth on a regular basis.

I want the party without a tracker to be poor at tracking, just like the party without a trapfinder is poor at trapfinding, the party with no healers is poor at healing and the party with no fighter-types is poor at fighting. For me that's natural...

"Poor" doesn't mean "unable" however. The point is in the average. With no tracker, it is good if it's still possible for the others to give it a try(*) when it's really needed, but not worth trying to make it as a regular tactic.

(*)There is a hidden problem here, that IMXP if no one is the dedicated tracker (or whatever) and there is no penalty for failure, typically everybody starts trying which actually very likely increases the chance of success compared to when only the Ranger tries and the others assume it's not worth trying.

 

[Quickleaf]

I would really, really want the math behind to make untrained checks possible but not worth on a regular basis.

I want the party without a tracker to be poor at tracking, just like the party without a trapfinder is poor at trapfinding, the party with no healers is poor at healing and the party with no fighter-types is poor at fighting. For me that's natural...

"Poor" doesn't mean "unable" however. The point is in the average. With no tracker, it is good if it's still possible for the others to give it a try(*) when it's really needed, but not worth trying to make it as a regular tactic.

(*)There is a hidden problem here, that IMXP if no one is the dedicated tracker (or whatever) and there is no penalty for failure, typically everybody starts trying which actually very likely increases the chance of success compared to when only the Ranger tries and the others assume it's not worth trying.

One thing Apocalypse/Dungeon World totally nailed was that failure shouldn't mean "nothing happens." In the case of failed track checks, I've often seen DMs (myself included) simply say "you can't pick up the tracks because...it rained." I think the D&D Next rules should duplicity call out how to adjudicate failures.

For example, instead it would be "ok, you follow what you think are the tracks about a half days' hike into the deep woods when you realize that they were circling back to you..."

Or "you track till it gets late but you've pushed yourselves hard and your quarry still has outpaced you, you are in troll-infested hills around midnight."

Or "you lose the quarry's tracks at the edge of Bittern Wood and Howling Hills where the Shyvern River runs, you don't know which way they went next."

Making failure meaningful tends to nip "party pile-on checks" in the bud.

 

[Kobold Stew]

As long as there are some rules, then the characters with that ability need to have a meaningful advantage over characters without the ability.

Tracking risks losing that. It may be that an automatic +5 difficulty for the untrained will be reasonable (the precise details of the math depend on the final decisions), or it may be that the ability simply isn't there.

COmpare the current rules for trip and disarm.

Trip is an ability available to some fighters.
Disarm is an (implicit) opposed strength check, with inconclusive guidelines about who can pick up dropped objects when.*

*Clarification: the current testpack seems to have removed references to disarming in combat, so I have to use the last testpack's guidelines. Hence "implicit".

In previous editions, training in both of those might have been managed with feats. I'm fine with the difference, but once Trip has the regulated place, it feels cheap to allow anyone to trip in combat -- and unfair to the player who invests in that option. And I accept that that may be a "trick" that is only available to some fighters.

I like the previous openness to disarm, but I want clear guidelines about how it can be effected by the capable, and what is being measured. With no guidelines at all, it becomes a STR or DEX check vs. STR, I'd say, and that the disarming person can hold the weapon if they have a free hand. Easy, an adjudication on the fly that doesn't need formal rules. (and this is given as an example).

But once rules are in place, then there has to be a reason to build a character towards the stated goals, and not let it be available generally, particularly when no member of a party has invested in the skill.

 

[Mistwell]

One thing Apocalypse/Dungeon World totally nailed was that failure shouldn't mean "nothing happens." In the case of failed track checks, I've often seen DMs (myself included) simply say "you can't pick up the tracks because...it rained." I think the D&D Next rules should duplicity call out how to adjudicate failures.

For example, instead it would be "ok, you follow what you think are the tracks about a half days' hike into the deep woods when you realize that they were circling back to you..."

Or "you track till it gets late but you've pushed yourselves hard and your quarry still has outpaced you, you are in troll-infested hills around midnight."

Or "you lose the quarry's tracks at the edge of Bittern Wood and Howling Hills where the Shyvern River runs, you don't know which way they went next."

Making failure meaningful tends to nip "party pile-on checks" in the bud.

God I hope not. I dislike that sort of hard-coded role-playing rule.

 

[Kobold Stew]

God I hope not. I dislike that sort of hard-coded role-playing rule.

It's a very robust (and fun!) system -- not to be knocked without trying it in play! Whether it's right for D&D is a legitimate question, but it shouldn't be removed out of hand.

 

[Fanaelialae]

IMO, the Ranger's tracking ability seems to say that the Ranger is automatically great at tracking, rather than that others cannot track. It says that the Ranger automatically succeeds under many circumstances. The way I'd rule it is that where a Ranger automatically succeeds, other characters would have to make a check. That seems to me the intent.