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Message: <blockquote data-quote="clearstream" data-source="post: 8476728" data-attributes="member: 71699">There's no need to settle that for the moment. As things stand, we're waiting on you to find a way to discount skills as game elements from being specific enough to form exceptions to general rules.  You put forward something like -<ol> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">All skills are not actions, they’re a source of bonuses on a subset of ability checks.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Ability checks are not actions, they’re a step in the action resolution process; a step which comes after determining uncertainty, if uncertainty is established.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">An action that is resolved by the general action resolution process can either succeed (if it has no chance of failure or no stakes), fail (if it has no chance of success), or be resolved with an ability check.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">An action taken with the goal of forcing a PC to think, feel, or do something succeeds if the player decides it does, or fails if the player decides it does.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">There is no opportunity for an ability check of any kind to be made, because based on the goal, the process for resolving it says it should succeed or fail.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">If a more specific process governs the resolution of the action, such as the spellcasting rules, then none of this is relevant to the resolution process of that action.</li> </ol>In 6, you are helping yourself to something that isn't justified by RAW. RAW doesn't say it needs to be a more specific process, and doesn't limit exceptions to processes. Nor to applying at any specific point in a process. Any specific game element can form an exception to how the game works. How the game works: exceptions aren't required to even sign up to an order of operations. To put it clearly, <ol> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">For the sake of argument, I concede that PHB 185 is a general rule that has the consequence that the things covered by it can't be ruled uncertain by a DM because they are up to player determination</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Specific beats general: skills as game elements are specific-enough to be exceptions, meaning that they can break the rules. One rule they break is PHB 185.</li> </ol></blockquote>

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