Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="iserith" data-source="post: 6750630" data-attributes="member: 97077">I decide this when I describe the environment. I'm always going to telegraph a trap to make it a fair challenge. A &quot;good&quot; trap won't be as obvious in the description. A &quot;bad trap&quot; will be. Once the players describe what they want to do, I can decide if what they want to do has an uncertain outcome and set a DC accordingly.I think the part relevant to my points in this discussion comes down to what the task is. The player is the one who describes the task that is undertaken and a DC is set according to that. A DM could write down a list of possible tasks and DCs for each, but this is a waste of time in my view since contingent prep is not all going to be used. I submit that this is what the example traps in the DMG or in modules are doing:The above excerpt from the collapsing roof trap shows what I'm talking about. Try to spot the tripwire requires a player to describe keeping an eye out for hidden threats, particularly on the floor (that's the task) and this specific effort is uncertain, but easy. Trying to the trip wire specifically using thieves' tools (the task) is similarly uncertain and of medium difficulty. It's uncertain and harder to avoid a negative outcome when trying to cut the trip wire with any other edged implement (the task).If a player chooses to do none of these tasks, then thinking up all those tasks and DCs was in my view a waste of prep time. Therefore, I recommend leaving off on DCs and tasks when designing traps in favor of preparing how the trap works and how it is telegraphed, establishing DCs only after players have described what they want to do.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="iserith, post: 6750630, member: 97077"] I decide this when I describe the environment. I'm always going to telegraph a trap to make it a fair challenge. A "good" trap won't be as obvious in the description. A "bad trap" will be. Once the players describe what they want to do, I can decide if what they want to do has an uncertain outcome and set a DC accordingly. I think the part relevant to my points in this discussion comes down to what the task is. The [I]player[/I] is the one who describes the task that is undertaken and a DC is set according to that. A DM could write down a list of possible tasks and DCs for each, but this is a waste of time in my view since contingent prep is not all going to be used. I submit that this is what the example traps in the DMG or in modules are doing: The above excerpt from the collapsing roof trap shows what I'm talking about. Try to spot the tripwire requires a player to describe keeping an eye out for hidden threats, particularly on the floor (that's the task) and this specific effort is uncertain, but easy. Trying to the trip wire specifically using thieves' tools (the task) is similarly uncertain and of medium difficulty. It's uncertain and harder to avoid a negative outcome when trying to cut the trip wire with any other edged implement (the task). If a player chooses to do none of these tasks, then thinking up all those tasks and DCs was in my view a waste of prep time. Therefore, I recommend leaving off on DCs and tasks when designing traps in favor of preparing how the trap works and how it is telegraphed, establishing DCs only after players have described what they want to do. [/QUOTE]

Verification