So for most of our campaign we have had only one strength focused character, a vengeance paladin/rogue who took expertise in Athletics. When our bard died in a boss fight, this was actually the paladins character quest, he rolled up a battlemaster fighter to be the strong commander role for the party. For most of the campaign I have allowed Athletics to be used for feats of strength related tasks, pulling doors off hinges, pushing heavy things, etc..., but I feel this might be unrewarding for the new battlemaster because of the paladins multiclassed expertise in athletics. The fighter has a higher strength, 18 to the paladins 16, but because of expertise the paladin surpasses him in the athletics skill. I was considering narrowing the focus of athletics to be more in line with the PHB, swimming, climbing, jumping, etc..., and have straight strength checks for pushing, lifting, dragging. Is this a considerate solution? I haven't talked with the players yet, which if its no big deal then I won't change anything, but I feel it may be good to get an idea from others incase future situations come up. I'm thinking a barbarian in a party with a paladin or fighter who multiclasses rogue for the same reason.
Something I like to do is ask a player how they intend to use their skill if they prefer to use a different skill to solve certain problems. Athletics basically measures feats of strength and skill that also involve some sort of technique... climbing isn't just a matter of being strong enough to lift yourself, but also knowledge of how to maintain balance and take advantage of footholds. So something that's just "lift heavy object" is normally just a question of if you've got the sheer chutzpah to pull it off. But maybe your player can explain how they're applying skill and technique to the task, at which point I'd allow an athletics check instead of pure strength.
That was my initial thought. Though lifting heavy things technically takes skill and strength, which would include athletics as a skill tied to it. RAW interpretation says it doesn't but do any weightlifting with terrible posture and technique and you won't be able to lift well. Arguably, it takes skill to lift well. Hence why I leaned on athletics heavily for such things. I feel the only reasoning I could hold to is that in this game, lifting, dragging, and pushing are considered purely strength. I could factor in the 30 times your strength score is your limit but applying that is more mental acrobatics than I care to do during game.
Though lifting heavy things technically takes skill and strength, which would include athletics as a skill tied to it. RAW interpretation says it doesn't but do any weightlifting with terrible posture and technique and you won't be able to lift well. Arguably, it takes skill to lift well. Hence why I leaned on athletics heavily for such things.
This is exactly my group's position and why we almost never use straight STR checks. Simply using your body's strength effectively requires technique. Lifting absolutely does. The relatively low return on investment you get from athletics proficiency only further justifies this IMO.
If your fighter wanted to be better at athletic feats, they could have taken proficiency in athletics. As it is, they are stronger but are less able to utilize the full force of that strength just as an arm wrestler can beat a stronger opponent with good technique.
He does have proficiency in it. It's that the Paladin has multiclassed into rogue to get expertise. I typically don't have an issue. I honestly doubt that there would be a big issue, if any, about it. It does bring an interesting issue with multiclassing and pure character builds. A pure barbarian with 24 strength could be bested by a fighter who took a single dip in rogue for expertise in athletics. Makes putting your strength up less important for skills if you can single dip into rogue to boost that skill. Considering it's typically used for such actions. How often do DMs calculate weight to bring limits to strength scores? Myself, I rarely do.
It's ok having two characters who are good at things. In this case your paladin is *very* good at athletics, and your fighter is good at them. Your fighter is going to be better than the paladin at other things.
Also, as a GM you can throw in challenges that need at least two people working together to overcome. Or your fighter could regularly assist the paladin to give them advantage etc...
, pulling doors off hinges, pushing heavy things, etc...,
I don't have an actual solution to your problem but wanted to chime in with what I do. For the things you mention, I often don't have players make a roll. I give it a stat threshold instead. Meaning you need a total of 20 STR points in order to move the rock whether is it one person or more than one.
The reason being because if it's just a STR roll, then the STR 8 guy could move the rock with luck and the 20 STR guy could fail. That doesn't make sense to me for brute power objectives.
For some stuff it totally makes sense that athletic conditioning would help (like a clean and jerk to pull up a portcullis) while other stuff (like opening the pickles) not so much.
To use an IRL example, for something like demo work (ripping out old construction), athletics might be helpful for a few specific parts, but overall it’s mostly just sheer brute force. The athletics would mostly come down to the conditioning to determine if you get gassed by lunch or can keep going strong until the boss calls it a day. So, someone with higher Strength but little to no (Athletics) might be better at ripping out that plaster & lath, molding, etc., however the person with less Str but more athletic conditioning would be able to keep working for longer.
You can always determine that some feat or prowess only require a flat Strenght check rather than associate it to a skill. I feel nixing Strenght checks this way will punish the Paladin that invested in Strenght (Athletics) to favor another character that hasn't but that is natually stronger. In the end, if a check can be tied to Athletics, i dont feel PC ability should be a reason to break that. They're not in competition and it's perfectly reasonable why a character more expert in Athletics sometimes may offer better performance than a stronger character. Technique and expertise can outmatch innate ability score.
You definitely shouldn't punish one player just to make another player feel better. Like has already been mentioned, there are many ways to solve this. Have challenges that require more than one person or two separate challenges that have to be done at the same time, etc. If the fighter really wants to be good at Athletics, they can always take the skill expert feat so there really is no competition. :)
I wouldn't say that is punishing a player by placing the limitations of choosing to have a lower strength score. It wouldn't affect grappling, the most common use of athletics. To say one player has to take feats in order for his strength score to actually compete against someone who, by game logic, is weaker feels like poor reasoning. My suggestion doesn't negate climbing, swimming, jumping, etc... the RAW suggestion of what is an athletics check. If you switch the character in focus, would the fighter be punished for choosing to have higher strength but not taking a feat for better athletics? He will already not be as good at grappling, escaping grapples, climbing, etc... But he will also not be able to showcase that he is stronger because the player made his strength higher but not his athletics, even though they are proficient. Of course, this is all due to utilizing athletics for most, if not all, feats of strength. I do appreciate the opinions everyone is giving. If a decision is to be made it'll be made by the group as a whole for what feels right. I was curious what others had to say on it. I do disagree on the notion it is punishment, though. I will probably go the route of having some things be pure strength checks. We have a festival coming up so I have feats of both athleticism and strength as part of the festival games where they can both shine, respectively.
Iamsposta - I do like the way you broke that down. I might use that differentiation in the future.
Something I probably should have stated about the two characters, they are very much in competition. The players have been having fun playing these two meatheads clashing against each other. So I want to pull that in as much as possible as they begin to grow respect for the other's attributes. The strength(athletics) issue, minor in comparison to the roleplay differences they have, was one I wanted some outside insight on
, pulling doors off hinges, pushing heavy things, etc...,
I don't have an actual solution to your problem but wanted to chime in with what I do. For the things you mention, I often don't have players make a roll. I give it a stat threshold instead. Meaning you need a total of 20 STR points in order to move the rock whether is it one person or more than one.
The reason being because if it's just a STR roll, then the STR 8 guy could move the rock with luck and the 20 STR guy could fail. That doesn't make sense to me for brute power objectives.
This is a perfect place to use a "passive athletics" score, instead of just raw stat points; so that those with proficiency/expertise in Athletics can still have it affect their chance of success.
Something I probably should have stated about the two characters, they are very much in competition. The players have been having fun playing these two meatheads clashing against each other. So I want to pull that in as much as possible as they begin to grow respect for the other's attributes. The strength(athletics) issue, minor in comparison to the roleplay differences they have, was one I wanted some outside insight on
The second player choosing expertise in Athletics seems more like a player decision to be better at Athletics, rather than a character decision.
The choice for multiclassing was mostly powergaming by his account. Though that was before the fighter was in the party. Their general beef is entirely roleplay. A vengeance Paladin who committed treason against a Lord's control of a city and a fighter who serves said lord. I don't mind powergaming decisions, I actually suggested he go rogue since he was looking for the boost and optimization. I reward character decisions more so than optimal player decisions. They know this fairly well by now. We are all close friends. These guys just enjoy butting heads and it comes into play at the table. I don't typically like passive checks for active skills. I do lock some people out of rolling if they aren't proficient in said skill. That's for select cases though. So I don't have that issue of a character who shouldn't succeed somehow championing over the archetype that should do so without a doubt.
This is exactly my group's position and why we almost never use straight STR checks. Simply using your body's strength effectively requires technique. Lifting absolutely does.
It requires technique to avoid hurting yourself or tiring yourself out prematurely from inefficiency, but it requires very little practice and once you know what you're doing additional experience/practice is not going to improve your results.
I really dislike using Athletics for brute strength (i.e. no complex or explosive movements, no endurance tests) because the game assumes proficiencies take a lot of training to acquire and that they have a large effect on the outcome. It's like saying if I diligently practice carrying light boxes around for a few years, that experience will enable me to out-lift someone with twice my muscle mass that hasn't been training with boxes. I've never met anyone that thought it was natural for a 10 STR Rogue to out-lift an 18 Strength character just because they have Expertise.
I generally go with Wysperra's approach outside of initiative order and simple strength checks in time-sensitive situations. It's often a given the character will succeed, but they might not be able to pull that rusty lever or completely lift that heavy portcullis on the first try.
The Fighter, in the end, hits harder, right? So he doesn't get the gold in the decathlon, if they contest Gimli and Legolas style in damage dealt, that's a contest that matters. :)
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
So the Paladin used one of their 5 Feats just to get an edge over a Fighter, that has 7? That’s dedication!
At this point, the Paladin deserves to have that edge and if the Fighter was worth his salt he’d put up or shut up. Hahaha
Rules as written, Athletics is used for climbing, swimming and jumping-style actions, not brute strength things. Just go with that and let them roll off each time they use Str or Athletics, and let the higher roll get to brag about it.
Appreciate all the input! I was going to put some of this to test during a festival game and see how it feels. It'll be like those ninja warrior runs. So they have to race to beat the others time. Athletics or Acrobatics will bring them through beginning sections better but they will have rounds of having to use their strength in order to open the next section up for completion. Failure will result in a task taking more time. For straight checks I'll modify the DCs to be attainable. I was also thinking of figuring a way to bring in the maximum lift capacity of 30xSTR. Maybe an athletics check can increase that maximum by 25%? Still gives a higher strength character an edge but allows a lower strength/higher athletics a chance to put out a similar amount of power. The mental gymnastics of it I don't prefer but if I make a general table of size to weight I could probably ballpark it on the fly
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
So for most of our campaign we have had only one strength focused character, a vengeance paladin/rogue who took expertise in Athletics. When our bard died in a boss fight, this was actually the paladins character quest, he rolled up a battlemaster fighter to be the strong commander role for the party. For most of the campaign I have allowed Athletics to be used for feats of strength related tasks, pulling doors off hinges, pushing heavy things, etc..., but I feel this might be unrewarding for the new battlemaster because of the paladins multiclassed expertise in athletics. The fighter has a higher strength, 18 to the paladins 16, but because of expertise the paladin surpasses him in the athletics skill. I was considering narrowing the focus of athletics to be more in line with the PHB, swimming, climbing, jumping, etc..., and have straight strength checks for pushing, lifting, dragging. Is this a considerate solution? I haven't talked with the players yet, which if its no big deal then I won't change anything, but I feel it may be good to get an idea from others incase future situations come up. I'm thinking a barbarian in a party with a paladin or fighter who multiclasses rogue for the same reason.
Your plan makes sense to me.
Something I like to do is ask a player how they intend to use their skill if they prefer to use a different skill to solve certain problems. Athletics basically measures feats of strength and skill that also involve some sort of technique... climbing isn't just a matter of being strong enough to lift yourself, but also knowledge of how to maintain balance and take advantage of footholds. So something that's just "lift heavy object" is normally just a question of if you've got the sheer chutzpah to pull it off. But maybe your player can explain how they're applying skill and technique to the task, at which point I'd allow an athletics check instead of pure strength.
Watch Crits for Breakfast, an adults-only RP-Heavy Roll20 Livestream at twitch.tv/afterdisbooty
And now you too can play with the amazing art and assets we use in Roll20 for our campaign at Hazel's Emporium
That was my initial thought. Though lifting heavy things technically takes skill and strength, which would include athletics as a skill tied to it. RAW interpretation says it doesn't but do any weightlifting with terrible posture and technique and you won't be able to lift well. Arguably, it takes skill to lift well. Hence why I leaned on athletics heavily for such things. I feel the only reasoning I could hold to is that in this game, lifting, dragging, and pushing are considered purely strength. I could factor in the 30 times your strength score is your limit but applying that is more mental acrobatics than I care to do during game.
This is exactly my group's position and why we almost never use straight STR checks. Simply using your body's strength effectively requires technique. Lifting absolutely does. The relatively low return on investment you get from athletics proficiency only further justifies this IMO.
If your fighter wanted to be better at athletic feats, they could have taken proficiency in athletics. As it is, they are stronger but are less able to utilize the full force of that strength just as an arm wrestler can beat a stronger opponent with good technique.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
He does have proficiency in it. It's that the Paladin has multiclassed into rogue to get expertise. I typically don't have an issue. I honestly doubt that there would be a big issue, if any, about it. It does bring an interesting issue with multiclassing and pure character builds. A pure barbarian with 24 strength could be bested by a fighter who took a single dip in rogue for expertise in athletics. Makes putting your strength up less important for skills if you can single dip into rogue to boost that skill. Considering it's typically used for such actions. How often do DMs calculate weight to bring limits to strength scores? Myself, I rarely do.
It's ok having two characters who are good at things. In this case your paladin is *very* good at athletics, and your fighter is good at them. Your fighter is going to be better than the paladin at other things.
Also, as a GM you can throw in challenges that need at least two people working together to overcome. Or your fighter could regularly assist the paladin to give them advantage etc...
I don't have an actual solution to your problem but wanted to chime in with what I do. For the things you mention, I often don't have players make a roll. I give it a stat threshold instead. Meaning you need a total of 20 STR points in order to move the rock whether is it one person or more than one.
The reason being because if it's just a STR roll, then the STR 8 guy could move the rock with luck and the 20 STR guy could fail. That doesn't make sense to me for brute power objectives.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
For some stuff it totally makes sense that athletic conditioning would help (like a clean and jerk to pull up a portcullis) while other stuff (like opening the pickles) not so much.
To use an IRL example, for something like demo work (ripping out old construction), athletics might be helpful for a few specific parts, but overall it’s mostly just sheer brute force. The athletics would mostly come down to the conditioning to determine if you get gassed by lunch or can keep going strong until the boss calls it a day. So, someone with higher Strength but little to no (Athletics) might be better at ripping out that plaster & lath, molding, etc., however the person with less Str but more athletic conditioning would be able to keep working for longer.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
You can always determine that some feat or prowess only require a flat Strenght check rather than associate it to a skill. I feel nixing Strenght checks this way will punish the Paladin that invested in Strenght (Athletics) to favor another character that hasn't but that is natually stronger. In the end, if a check can be tied to Athletics, i dont feel PC ability should be a reason to break that. They're not in competition and it's perfectly reasonable why a character more expert in Athletics sometimes may offer better performance than a stronger character. Technique and expertise can outmatch innate ability score.
You definitely shouldn't punish one player just to make another player feel better. Like has already been mentioned, there are many ways to solve this. Have challenges that require more than one person or two separate challenges that have to be done at the same time, etc. If the fighter really wants to be good at Athletics, they can always take the skill expert feat so there really is no competition. :)
I wouldn't say that is punishing a player by placing the limitations of choosing to have a lower strength score. It wouldn't affect grappling, the most common use of athletics. To say one player has to take feats in order for his strength score to actually compete against someone who, by game logic, is weaker feels like poor reasoning. My suggestion doesn't negate climbing, swimming, jumping, etc... the RAW suggestion of what is an athletics check. If you switch the character in focus, would the fighter be punished for choosing to have higher strength but not taking a feat for better athletics? He will already not be as good at grappling, escaping grapples, climbing, etc... But he will also not be able to showcase that he is stronger because the player made his strength higher but not his athletics, even though they are proficient. Of course, this is all due to utilizing athletics for most, if not all, feats of strength. I do appreciate the opinions everyone is giving. If a decision is to be made it'll be made by the group as a whole for what feels right. I was curious what others had to say on it. I do disagree on the notion it is punishment, though. I will probably go the route of having some things be pure strength checks. We have a festival coming up so I have feats of both athleticism and strength as part of the festival games where they can both shine, respectively.
Iamsposta - I do like the way you broke that down. I might use that differentiation in the future.
Wyesperra - This is an interesting solution. I'll definitely consider this when planning for future scenarios
Something I probably should have stated about the two characters, they are very much in competition. The players have been having fun playing these two meatheads clashing against each other. So I want to pull that in as much as possible as they begin to grow respect for the other's attributes. The strength(athletics) issue, minor in comparison to the roleplay differences they have, was one I wanted some outside insight on
This is a perfect place to use a "passive athletics" score, instead of just raw stat points; so that those with proficiency/expertise in Athletics can still have it affect their chance of success.
The second player choosing expertise in Athletics seems more like a player decision to be better at Athletics, rather than a character decision.
The choice for multiclassing was mostly powergaming by his account. Though that was before the fighter was in the party. Their general beef is entirely roleplay. A vengeance Paladin who committed treason against a Lord's control of a city and a fighter who serves said lord. I don't mind powergaming decisions, I actually suggested he go rogue since he was looking for the boost and optimization. I reward character decisions more so than optimal player decisions. They know this fairly well by now. We are all close friends. These guys just enjoy butting heads and it comes into play at the table. I don't typically like passive checks for active skills. I do lock some people out of rolling if they aren't proficient in said skill. That's for select cases though. So I don't have that issue of a character who shouldn't succeed somehow championing over the archetype that should do so without a doubt.
It requires technique to avoid hurting yourself or tiring yourself out prematurely from inefficiency, but it requires very little practice and once you know what you're doing additional experience/practice is not going to improve your results.
I really dislike using Athletics for brute strength (i.e. no complex or explosive movements, no endurance tests) because the game assumes proficiencies take a lot of training to acquire and that they have a large effect on the outcome. It's like saying if I diligently practice carrying light boxes around for a few years, that experience will enable me to out-lift someone with twice my muscle mass that hasn't been training with boxes. I've never met anyone that thought it was natural for a 10 STR Rogue to out-lift an 18 Strength character just because they have Expertise.
I generally go with Wysperra's approach outside of initiative order and simple strength checks in time-sensitive situations. It's often a given the character will succeed, but they might not be able to pull that rusty lever or completely lift that heavy portcullis on the first try.
The Forum Infestation (TM)
The Fighter, in the end, hits harder, right? So he doesn't get the gold in the decathlon, if they contest Gimli and Legolas style in damage dealt, that's a contest that matters. :)
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
So the Paladin used one of their 5 Feats just to get an edge over a Fighter, that has 7? That’s dedication!
At this point, the Paladin deserves to have that edge and if the Fighter was worth his salt he’d put up or shut up. Hahaha
Rules as written, Athletics is used for climbing, swimming and jumping-style actions, not brute strength things. Just go with that and let them roll off each time they use Str or Athletics, and let the higher roll get to brag about it.
Appreciate all the input! I was going to put some of this to test during a festival game and see how it feels. It'll be like those ninja warrior runs. So they have to race to beat the others time. Athletics or Acrobatics will bring them through beginning sections better but they will have rounds of having to use their strength in order to open the next section up for completion. Failure will result in a task taking more time. For straight checks I'll modify the DCs to be attainable. I was also thinking of figuring a way to bring in the maximum lift capacity of 30xSTR. Maybe an athletics check can increase that maximum by 25%? Still gives a higher strength character an edge but allows a lower strength/higher athletics a chance to put out a similar amount of power. The mental gymnastics of it I don't prefer but if I make a general table of size to weight I could probably ballpark it on the fly