D&D General Why Exploration Is the Worst Pillar

[Ovinomancer]

Angry GM's Tension Pool is indeed a great tool for tracking time and checking for complications. Each die represents a 10 minutes turn and the bowl is emptied when the sixth dice is added.

I don't think it requires that each die by a 10 minute chunk. It's more amorphous than that -- each die represents making too much noise, or taking awhile, or just general time passing, but not necessarily a 10 minute turn. You can absolutely do that, but then you're just tracking turns a la B/X, so what's the point of the new tool?

 

[Asisreo]

Why is it when people cry about their verisimilitude, it's never about things like the game thinking you can't train in techniques involving feats of strength and thinks it's all raw force? Lots of big burly dudes with dislocated shoulders, that's all I'm saying.

I don't complain about verisimilitude and I really don't care much about it. Its the RAW that athletics has nothing to do with breaking down doors.

If you want proficiency to have something to do with it, let it be Carpenter's Tools when its wooden doors and Smith's or Tinkerer's tools when they're stone or iron. Whichever you decide but doors have nothing to do with jumping, climbing, or swimming.

 

[Faolyn]

No, hitting a dead end is because you've become lost, not that you aren't lost you just aren't where you expect to be.

Look, I can know where I am, but not know where X is. This is very true. However, if I start out with the intention to get to X, then I am lost -- I do not know my way. While this is a very literal reading of what "can't be lost is," it does show the issues with this kind of ability because you cannot point to a line where you are or aren't lost with regards to getting to X.

I'd say that being lost means that you can't retrace your steps to get back to your starting point. Rangers can always retrace their steps.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I'd say that being lost means that you can't retrace your steps to get back to your starting point. Rangers can always retrace their steps.

That's a rather idiosyncratic definition. I can be lost, walk a mile, and get back to the same place I was lost before. I don't become unlost.

 

[Faolyn]

Why is it when people cry about their verisimilitude, it's never about things like the game thinking you can't train in techniques involving feats of strength and thinks it's all raw force? Lots of big burly dudes with dislocated shoulders, that's all I'm saying.

By RAW, Athletics is about things like jumping, climbing, and swimming. Bashing down a door is just throwing your weight around.

 

[Faolyn]

That's a rather idiosyncratic definition. I can be lost, walk a mile, and get back to the same place I was lost before. I don't become unlost.

If you're wandering around in a circle and that's how you got back to your starting point, but you didn't really plan on doing that, you were lost. But lucky.

If you deliberately turn around and go back the way you came, you weren't lost.

That's my definition, anyway.

 

[Vaalingrade]

By RAW, Athletics is about things like jumping, climbing, and swimming. Bashing down a door is just throwing your weight around.

Yes, that's... exactly what I'm saying.

Smashing in a door by throwing your weight around doesn't really work because it's something you have to learn how to do. The game disagrees. But that's not fun, so people are okay with non-magic people doing it.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Then they are poorly designed traps.

And I've never seen a resource that really makes a well-designed trap, but you seem more intent on judging games I have been in rather than anything about the points I'm making.

I don't cater the world to my players. People don't suddenly stop using a lock because there's an expert lockpicker in town.

Once I create something, its based off of the world and the story I'm telling. I still have some DC 10 checks in my high level adventures and I don't know if it will be useless or not. Because rogues die, wizards can get wish penalties, and fighters can be frightened I don't make assumptions.

Right but, passive checks, you succeed, why bother doing more than mentioning it?

I mean, I don't sit there when a DM presents me with a challenge I can't possibly fail and think "wow, I'm so glad this is so realistic and the DM didn't cater to the party" I'm usually thinking "Why am I bothering to roll this and waste time"

So, if the purpose of the trap is to be seen and avoided... just let it be seen and avoided. Oh, I understand that the fictional people who made the fictional trap in the fictional world had the fictional purpose of stopping intruders. But the reality at the table is that you placed a trap that has no chance of doing anything except being a waste of time. Unless the players "make a mistake" and then it is a disaster. So, of course, they try even harder to never make a mistake... meaning that the trap is again just a waste of time and effort.

Those DM's did those clerics a disservice. Suddenly ambush-type creatures don't ambush anymore because the cleric is too sharp? Then what's the point of making your cleric sharp?

... To avoid traps and ambushes? I'm not saying it is the best solution, but if the cleric is going to spot every trap, and see every ambush then there is also a point where adding those into the game is just putting them in so you can tell the cleric that they are about to be ambushed.

The whole point was to notice stuff but since the DM is upset that the players protected themselves, he threw up his hands and said screw it. Its petty and a hate when DMs do that.

Besides, high Perception doesn't beat ambushes and traps for the whole group, it just has the cleric notice those things that are off in the environment.

And they then tell the party... You do let the party communicate right?

He sees an odd glare in his path but he has to look closer to determine if its a shard of glass or a tripwire.

So... having a high enough passive perception to see a trap just means I get to roll perception to see if I see the trap? Isn't that an utter waste of time? It almost comes across like wanting a roll so the player can fail and then not see the thing they saw.

 

[Faolyn]

Yes, that's... exactly what I'm saying.

Smashing in a door by throwing your weight around doesn't really work because it's something you have to learn how to do. The game disagrees. But that's not fun, so people are okay with non-magic people doing it.

I don't think that you have to learn how to do it. You just have to be able to put your shoulder into it, and that's what's specified by a Strength check. The things that call for Athletics checks specifically require skill to perform. Not everyone has trained their muscles to properly swim against a current, perform an Olympics-sized jump, or climb of a sheer cliff that only has fingertip-sized places to grip.

I suppose you could houserule it that if you don't use Athletics, then trying to bash down a door with pure Strength causes you to take a bit of damage--like just using Strength to swim (if you aren't proficient in Athletics) causes you to be knocked off-course, thrown into rocks, or start to drown.

 

[iserith]

Just say you're drawing on your athletic prowess as a professional wrestler and do a running jump into a dropkick to break that door down. Who could argue that Athletics doesn't apply here? Nobody I'd want to play with, that's for sure.