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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 6649712" data-attributes="member: 82106">The problem I have with the 5e version is it that it is built on a paradigm that isn't the central paradigm of the game, which is an ever increasing ability to accomplish the same task. 'Easy' doesn't MEAN anything because its not actually descriptive except in some abstract sense that never exists in any actual game (some sort of 'common man' that nobody actually plays and is a different level than all but the level 1 PC). Its not 'unworkable', but it is inelegant and AT THE TABLE its not so intuitive. It also fails to inherently provide a guideline for people who are devising DCs. 4e DCs work better because you always know what the appropriate DC should be for the type of fiction you will present at level X, the easy, medium, and hard DCs for that level (and possibly for a range of levels up to 5 higher if for instance you want a 'major obstacle' type encounter, like a boss fight situation).Page 42 IS the ability check rules. There HAS to be a 'DC Chart' of some sort and every game has one. At the level of the pure mechanics of numbers and dice there's no difference between 3e, 4e, and 5e, except where your bonuses might come from and how fast they accumulate. The question is about presentation of information.This really is not true. In fact anyone with experience building/running higher level PCs will quickly tell you that the opposite is true. Its rather easy to run a 4e skill check modifier up into the +40 range, and if you TRY you can achieve values in most skills up into the +60 range. A character spending ALMOST nothing on his primary skills will still move it up at a +1/level pace. Beyond that its absurdly easy to get items and powers that let you succeed far more often. There are a plethora of 'roll again' options you can acquire, and MANY "+5 when using Skill X to things of type Y" (IE Long Jumper, Born of the Sea, etc) sorts of things.'Secondary' skills are still useful to PCs at all levels. Not in all situations at very high level, but they're far from being as hopeless as you would make out. The DC chart has a differential spread to it in order to allow for this. At level 1 the spread between medium and hard DC is 5, at level 30 it is 10. The easy DC also has a growing spread even beyond that. So at level 30 an easy DC is 24. With a +15 for level and AT LEAST a +1 for stat growth you will still pass the easy level 30 DC on an 8, the ONE LESS NUMBER THAN THE SAME PC NEEDED AT LEVEL 1. The medium DC grows by 20 pips, your 'I have nothing put into this skill at all' PC still only loses 4 pips vs level 1. He may fall off the end of the hard DC, but this is a character that has a 12 in a stat using an untrained skill to perform a task requiring GODLIKE ability. There has to be SOME POINT IN THE SYSTEM where you cannot succeed. Beyond that by level 30 MOST characters will have acquired some sort of reroll, at least a couple points of bonus that can be applied, and/or there will be easily acquired situational bonuses (IE from leaders, etc). A level 30 with an 'off' skill should STILL be able to garner a 75% chance of actually passing a medium check, often more. Most characters will do better than that.Nor is the choice in 4e between no bonus and a large bonus. MANY characters have training in a non-primary-stat skill. MANY characters have boosted stats and are NOT trained in corresponding skills. Many characters happen to acquire bonuses or ways to simply bypass various skill checks. So the more usual cases in 4e are that you can TRY a high level hard DC, you're just taking a big risk, or you can simply do something else (fly around the obstacle, swim, spider climb, teleport, etc).Again, this is just inaccurate in practice. Its not even really correct in theory. The growth in the hard DC in 4e is 23 points over 30 levels. You get 15 of those from level bonus. Stat bonus growth is variable but is ALWAYS +1 minimum, and typically for 'on' stat is between +4 and +6 (depends on your ED and if you started with 18 or 20 primary). +4 gets you total of +19, leaving only 3 points that are required from other sources. Core PHB1 probably assumed that would come from the Skill Focus feat (+3 on top of training). Even in PHB1 though there are quite a few feats that grant +1 to various skill checks, and some that grant more in specific situations. Magic is very inconsistent, but you can get up to +5 in many cases if you try. Rerolls are worth +4 and you can get them if you try. Oh fie! The original DC chart from DMG1 varies by only a couple of points from the current RC DC chart. The level one DCs are 10/15/20, the current ones are 8/12/19. The level 30 DCs were 25/29/33, and now are 24/32/42. So you can see there's a SLIGHT change at the higher levels, reflecting the idea that linear growth at +1/2 levels was far less than what really happened, which is more like +2/3 levels for 'good' skills. The original chart also assumed this was an untrained skill/ability bonus, later charts didn't make that assumption, so the actual numbers are even closer in practice.</blockquote>

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