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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ovinomancer" data-source="post: 8474105" data-attributes="member: 16814">It would be helpful if you'd stop Fisking.  I'm not delivering a Gish Gallop, so separating sentences that are thematically connected is really just looking to isolate and defeat in turn rather than deal with the argument as a whole. This is apparent throughout as the only argument you're really putting forward is that you like your assumption and are using it as a club while ignoring any other issues that arise from it.For example, in the first exchange the structure of your argument is that:Assumption:  All text is rules unless specifically called out otherwise.Assertion:  Ability checks are all written from the stance of the PCs taking action.Conclusion:  Monsters can also use ability checks despite no rules text indicating this, just not specific ones.There are numerous problems with this.  The one I was addressing was that there is no logical result from the assumptions and assertions that can result in that conclusion.  You've smuggled in additional assumptions but not stated them.  It's a bad argument.  However, the larger problem for your argument is that the opening for the Ability checks specifically says they can be used by both the PCs and the Monsters.  No special carve out is made for any of the six abilities or their associated proficiencies.  In short, this entire argument is flawed at the assertion level.This means that we're back to dealing with your assumption with regards to the single sentence in the Roleplaying section of the DMG (not even the PHB, so a player not reading the DMG is unaware of this critical rule and a GM that hasn't scrutinized the text for oddly placed rules would similarly be unaware of this critical rule).  And the rest of your post follows this argument.  You claim that your assumption makes the least hash of the rest of the rules, except I'm not sure it doesn't.  For one, we have to take this single sentence and read it back into the entirety of the rest of the rules such that in a step where multiple places in the text the GM is assigned the job of determining uncertainty we have to consider this one sentence is a strong and inviolable constraint on the GM's responsibility.  Yet it's not mentioned in any of these places at all.  Instead, we have additional rules information that does tell us monsters use CHA ability checks in exactly the same way as PCs.  We have rules information that tells us that success on these abilities for both monsters and PCs is the same.  Granted, we have additional information for NPCs that we do not have for PCs for how these can interact, but this doesn't obviate the multitude of other rules that indicate parity between PCs and NPCs and also how the text fails to note this critical limitation on the GM in the multiple places it talks about how the GM determines uncertainty and resolves it.In short, your argument that your reading makes the most sense has to overcome the problem that it relies on taking a single sentence from  a section not about running the game but about how players can engage in roleplaying and extrapolates that into a binding constraint on the GM that's not mentioned in the at least 4 other places I can think of that the part of the basic play loop relating to the GM determining uncertainty is discussed in detail.  The argument also has to deal with the fact that this kind of reading (all text is rules unless specifically excluded by the text) leads to numerous other contradictions and confusion points.  It also directly flies in the face of the natural language approach the developers have been clear about where conversational styles were adopted in large sections of the book that are not meant to be read as explicit rules. My suggestion would be to abandon the claim that you have the most bestest epistemologically sound argument.  It relies on assumption as much as any other, and has to engage in special pleading for the conflicts it creates as well.  I don't disagree with your conclusion -- social skills working on PCs is icky, involves GM Czege violations, and steps hard on the narrow front of player agency in 5e.  There are plenty of good reasons to not allow this.  Heck, even your reading of the rules is a good and solid reason.  Claiming it's the most bestest logical reading, though, it kinda out-of-bounds.  It's a reasonable reading, but it's not as solid as you seem to think it is.Finally, to drive home the point about social skills and the problem with the Roleplaying Rule -- insight vs deception.  If the PC is declaring an action to get a read on an NPC, that can be resolved by the PC's Insight vs the NPC's Deception.  The result informs the PC of how their character thinks on the topic.  Yes, I'm aware that you can take pains to carefully state the result in a way that doesn't directly tell the player how their PC thinks, but that's just a smokescreen, because the player is fundamentally asking to resolve what their PC thinks of the NPC.  Unless you stick to just describing facial tics and eye shifts, in which case you're either encoding the same info into a puzzle for the PC or just providing largely useless information the player can't reconcile, the result of this check will be telling the player something their PC thinks.  And this is a specifically allowed interaction in the rules, so it's 100% under the "all text is rules" assumption.  We now have to engage in some form of special pleading to excuse this violation of the rule (probably under some form of "specific defeats general" which then opens new fronts against why CHA checks, being more specific, don't overrule the Roleplaying Rule).  There are logical holes all over this argument as well.  It's not really the argument's fault, though, 5e is written in a loose manner that defies strict interpretation.  I happen to agree in large part with the approach you employ, I just can't stand behind this argument to support it.</blockquote>

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