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Message: <blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 9478510" data-attributes="member: 2067">There's something that seems off about this statement to me. If we go back to the example on swinging a sword vs. the talky bits, both seem to me to hinge on one shared rule: "Pretend to be your character."In certain circumstances, pretending to be your character means doing something with a chance of failure, and that's when we roll a die. Swinging a sword - at an enemy in combat - is one of the common times we roll a die. But to get to that position in the first place, you're just applying the more fundamental rule - "Pretend to be your character." You wouldn't be swinging your sword if it wasn't something Bill the Dwarf wouldn't do. We don't always use dice when swinging our sword, though. Like, you can hack through underbrush without rolling a die. Or cut a rope. Or, idk, shave. So this doesn't feel like a push/pull between two forces to me. It feels more like...if the base rule is "pretend to be your character," then when do we want to add complexity? Why is making an attack something we roll dice for, anyway? In a game where we've killed and questioned every sacred cow, why is 1d20 still worth preserving? Like, functionally? Turning this question around in my head, there's a lot of potential answers. In the lens of game design and player experience, rolling dice to attack is an attractive element, something that is quite fun to do. Luck and uncertainty make for a nice player tension, and that mirrors the character's own tension ("pretend to be your character"). It's a situation where chance would play a meaningful role. It's entertaining. That also helps reveal why we don't do much of that in the social role, though. It makes less sense that chance, luck, and uncertainty would play a meaningful role there. Like, sure, you can make some excuses, but if I am pretending to be my character, and I make a case as that character that would be persuasive to the other characters hearing it....why am I rolling? Why add complexity to something that was already pretty difficult? My character said what they said, either that's persuasive or it isn't, people's minds aren't so disconnected from what's going on around them that randomness plays a big part in it. It's a binary result based on the dispositions of the characters and the words said, none of which is random. (Though in modern D&D we tend to randomize some of that disposition or some of those words when we roll a Persuasion check). This isn't to say that there isn't a case for more roll-based social junk, just that there's an explanation for why it's been pretty minimal overall: no need to roll, most of the time.So, bringing this around to the Great Thief Debate, we can see that the tension might not be "do I want codified rules or do I want open-ended play," but perhaps is more "does an element of luck and chance add something fun to this particular verb? Does that element help me pretend to be my character better?"I can see that being answered differently in different contexts and at different tables. Do you need to roll dice for stealth?  To solve puzzles? To play a good song on your lute? To intimidate the goblins? IDK, you don't need to roll dice to attack, necessarily. All rolls are opt-in. How much would some uncertainty add?So I dunno about a push/pull between dice and no dice. The default mode is no dice, so the question is why do we EVER roll dice, when we NEVER have to? It seems to me like the dice are a tool you use in certain circumstances where it would add to the experience, and there's some differences between groups about when the dice actually add to the experience. Not too surprising to me that one of those differences was, "do the thief mechanics add to the experience of stealth in D&D"? (And given how weak sauce thieves have been historically, not too surprising that a lot of people rejected the idea of having to go through this sad little class for the minimal chance to hide in a shadow when they could just put out the torches and use infravision.)I don't think that codifying an ability necessarily means that you can no longer "do it" without the express ability. Did the invention of the thief prevent every stealth attempt of every other party? Given that the surprise die still was around, I don't think so.</blockquote>

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