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Message: <blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 6652701" data-attributes="member: 2067">I think your characterization of 5e's DC's is off. If a low level PC encounters a significantly high DC, there are a few things to note:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> There's still a chance, thanks to Bounded Accuracy and mechanics like advantage. There are vanishingly few DC's that are actually impossible. That's heroic and legendary - that's Bilbo Baggins sneaking into a dragon's lair. </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> The sense of accomplishment in overcoming the challenge is huge because the challenge doesn't calibrate itself to your capability. The lock doesn't care if you're a level 1 rogue or a level 20 rogue, so if you're a level 1 rogue and it's a very hard DC and you get it anyway - that's a huge win, a reward for clever play, and a lucky roll.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> A "managable" DC in that same situation would be a speedbump - roll until someone gets lucky enough to beat it. The "insane" DC in that situation presents a decision point - do we try and look for every edge we can to get through it, or do we go around? If we go around, where do we go? What do we do instead? How might we solve this issue if we can't go through this door? </li> </ul>Either one is a pretty sure bet when the chance for success only differs by a few almost cosmetic percentage points. And the fight actually is given favor in this situation since 4e PC's have unique combat powers to deal with fights and don't have a lot of unique exploration powers to deal with rickety bridges. I think this is one of the philosophical differences. If a game wants you to succeed, it's not offering a very meaningful choice - either way, you're probably going to succeed. Either way, you win. Either way, the good guys emerge victorious. The fight vs. the bridge doesn't actually affect your chances of the mission succeeding or failing much. 5e throws back to pre-4e game-centered philosophy in that in general it is perfectly okay with you failing disastrously, if that's how it plays out. Now, when the fight is at 1st level against a young green dragon and the bridge is rickety but at least manageable, things like reconnaissance and scouting and in-character research and questions pay off: they let you know the situation before you blunder into it, because if you blunder into a bad situation, you will eat it, and there will be consequences. It's not just choosing the color of the explosions in your ending, it's choosing if you get the good ending, or the bad one. Of course, you can have calibrated DC's as well (it's not hard to look at the proficiency bonus and say, "okay, this +10 is what my medium DC for a proficient character is, maybe +1-5 if I want to include the ability bonus"), so it doesn't exclude that more stable choice, either. Overcoming hard obstacles is part of the fun of play. Creating story out of dramatic decision points is part of the fun of play. There is a reason that "kill your darlings" is absolutely critical writing advice, and that stories where victory is assured are often dull. Games where you don't actually beat difficult challenges can also be underwhelming (imagine Super Meat Boy on "Easy mode.")Which isn't to say that there's One True Way, merely that the 5e default isn't game-destroying. It just encourages DMs to think about what the challenge should be over the course of an entire campaign, not necessarily what is challenging to their particular parties in the moment, because things like bounded accuracy ensure that if the players want to, or if they get lucky, they can hit things that you might have thought difficult.</blockquote>

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