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Message: <blockquote data-quote="iserith" data-source="post: 7607824" data-attributes="member: 97077">How the character thinks is in the control of the player, not the DM. As a result, there is no uncertainty - the character thinks whatever the player says he or she thinks.No doubt.The players in the example did not attempt to recall lore. One said he or she wanted to go buy some scrolls. The other said, only after the incredulous DM raised an eyebrow or the like, that he or she suggested a reason for the aforementioned task to the other character. No attempt to recall lore here. If there was, I might agree that an ability check was reasonable, provided it met the requirements for an ability check. But there wasn't. The DM just assumed there was and/or established for the player an action for his or her character which oversteps the DM's role.Without a meaningful consequence for failure, it doesn't fit within the game structure though. No meaningful consequence for failure, no roll. No roll, then either the character succeeds or fails outright, as determined by the DM. That is, of course, assuming we have a verbalized action declaration, which we don't in this example (where recalling lore is concerned). What we appear to have is a DM attempting to invalidate an action declaration by establishing a knowledge prerequisite to the task and then and using the dice as a potential means to do it.No reason you can imagine, anyway. As established upthread, particular knowledge about earth elementals is not required to buy scrolls of thunderwave. The barbarian might just like the sound it makes, as it reminds him or her of stormy nights on the steppe, safe under the protection of a yurt, drinking fermented aurochs milk with Frances who later became a town guard.As a fun exercise, keyword search "knowledge check" in the D&D 5e Basic Rules PDF. You won't get any results. You might if you're capable of keyword searching older editions of the game though.In D&D 5e, an Intelligence check may follow when the player describes the character attempting to recall lore or make deductions based on available clues, when there's an uncertain outcome and a meaningful consequence for failure.There is no rules support for the DM calling for "knowledge checks" to determine if a player's action declaration is valid in the first place.This would be fine in my game. Knowledge of a letter is not a prerequisite for rifling through a backpack. Similarly, in my game, the barbarian could just go buy the thunderwave scrolls, provided they are available and he or she has the gold. There would be no eyebrow raising from me when presented with that action declaration.The attempt to climb a non-existent wall just fails, no roll, since it does not meet the requirements for an ability check. It might be worth addressing what's going on in the fiction with the player in case he or she is under some kind of misapprehension about the environment, but ultimately, presuming that is not the case, the action declaration stands and the action fails.This is not the same as you inserting a knowledge prerequisite into an action declaration. Which is a common enough thing, by the way. Lots of DMs who have a particular definition and view of "metagaming" do this. There's just nothing in the rules to support it. It's an approach that appears to be derived from other games and a particular gamer culture.I don't make any assumptions about the PCs' actions. They act as they please. I adjudicate the outcomes. As a player, it's smart play to verify one's assumptions before acting upon them. But I make no assumptions that players will actually do that. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't. Sometimes their assumptions are correct and sometimes they aren't. As long as I am doing my part in adequately describing the environment and fairly adjudicating outcomes, it's fair as the players can pay attention and take action accordingly. If they want to take a risk, that's on them.One of the many benefits of this approach is that I don't have to worry about the kind of "metagaming" that a lot of DMs and players concern themselves with. It simply doesn't matter.In the specific context of the elemental example we've been discussing, there really is nothing there that is the DM's problem, except if he or she creates one by requiring a knowledge prerequisite to validate an action declaration.I don't really understand the point you're trying to make with how long a DM is running for a group though. I run games the same for my regular group as I do for one-shots with pickup groups with the possible exception that I'm more willing to entertain the Frances the guard situation from my regular group.</blockquote>

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