My players have been asking about training manuals, to increase skills, abilities, maybe even feats. Have any of you given such items out to your players?
So your players are asking if their characters can spend some time reading a textbook to get a permanent mechanical benefit? Personally, I'd say they'd have to follow the rules provided in the PHB (Chapter 8) and commit to either Training or Research. Giving players alternative ways to increase their Ability Scores, Skills, or gain Feats is essentially creating a new way for them to level up their characters. As such, it should be just as difficult and time consuming as Adventuring to gain those benefits.
Training
You can spend time between adventures learning a new language or training with a set of tools. Your DM might allow additional training options. (such as gaining proficiency in a skill) First, you must find an instructor willing to teach you. The DM determines how long it takes, and whether one or more ability checks are required. The training lasts for 250 days and costs 1 gp per day. After you spend the requisite amount of time and money, you learn the new language or gain proficiency with the new tool.
Research
The time between adventures is a great chance to perform research, gaining insight into mysteries that have unfurled over the course of the campaign. Research can include poring over dusty tomes and crumbling scrolls in a library or buying drinks for the locals to pry rumors and gossip from their lips. When you begin your research, the DM determines whether the information is available, how many days of downtime it will take to find it, and whether there are any restrictions on your research (such as needing to seek out a specific individual, tome, or location). The DM might also require you to make one or more ability checks, such as an Intelligence (Investigation) check to find clues pointing toward the information you seek, or a Charisma (Persuasion) check to secure someone's aid. Once those conditions are met, you learn the information if it is available. For each day of research, you must spend 1 gp to cover your expenses. This cost is in addition to your normal lifestyle expenses
Now, hypothetically, if a Cleric found a book called Grom's Guide to Desert Survival and I might allow the following: "If you spend a short rest (1 hour) reading this survival guide you'll have advantage on your next Survival check." Something simple and temporary like this isn't game breaking, and can help the player out in a meaningful way.
I've bee known to give out such things, like "totems" that boost base stats and training that could be purchased for skills. However, I prefer to try and roleplay most things in a bit more organically than "you can buy a skill manual for X skill for Y amount of money". For instance, with feats in particular, I've had it where there was an evil mage in a character's backstory that they had been tracking for years. When they finally found this mage and killed them, they earned the Mage Slayer feat. Similar things with other characters- Inspiring Leader given for a lovely pep talk and speech before a large-scale battle, Mobile for a rogue that was always focused on darting around everywhere and finding the optimal position to strike from, Durable for the gnome that had recovered from being turned to stone by a Gorgon... my point being that I find it best to try and personalize things for the players and not make an attempt to generalize. The same concept works with skills- if a character has taken a great interest in studying the wilderness during downtime, a Nature proficiency might be awarded. That doesn't mean that they say they do this during downtime- they actively pursue it both during sessions and even ask me about it outside of sessions when they say that their character is doing the research. That said, if you do use a more organic strategy like this, make sure to make an attempt to evenly distribute things between players, and remember that some feats are just straight better than others so be wary of how you give out powerful feats.
That said, I think the DM Guide does say something about training during downtime to get weapon proficiency which could probably easily be modified (make it more expensive) to work with this stuff, but I personally love the more roleplay-based approach and my players seem to appreciate that the actions of their character have an impact on their stats.
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My players have been asking about training manuals, to increase skills, abilities, maybe even feats. Have any of you given such items out to your players?
So your players are asking if their characters can spend some time reading a textbook to get a permanent mechanical benefit? Personally, I'd say they'd have to follow the rules provided in the PHB (Chapter 8) and commit to either Training or Research. Giving players alternative ways to increase their Ability Scores, Skills, or gain Feats is essentially creating a new way for them to level up their characters. As such, it should be just as difficult and time consuming as Adventuring to gain those benefits.
Training
You can spend time between adventures learning a new language or training with a set of tools. Your DM might allow additional training options. (such as gaining proficiency in a skill)
First, you must find an instructor willing to teach you. The DM determines how long it takes, and whether one or more ability checks are required.
The training lasts for 250 days and costs 1 gp per day. After you spend the requisite amount of time and money, you learn the new language or gain proficiency with the new tool.
Research
The time between adventures is a great chance to perform research, gaining insight into mysteries that have unfurled over the course of the campaign. Research can include poring over dusty tomes and crumbling scrolls in a library or buying drinks for the locals to pry rumors and gossip from their lips.
When you begin your research, the DM determines whether the information is available, how many days of downtime it will take to find it, and whether there are any restrictions on your research (such as needing to seek out a specific individual, tome, or location). The DM might also require you to make one or more ability checks, such as an Intelligence (Investigation) check to find clues pointing toward the information you seek, or a Charisma (Persuasion) check to secure someone's aid. Once those conditions are met, you learn the information if it is available.
For each day of research, you must spend 1 gp to cover your expenses. This cost is in addition to your normal lifestyle expenses
Now, hypothetically, if a Cleric found a book called Grom's Guide to Desert Survival and I might allow the following: "If you spend a short rest (1 hour) reading this survival guide you'll have advantage on your next Survival check." Something simple and temporary like this isn't game breaking, and can help the player out in a meaningful way.
I've bee known to give out such things, like "totems" that boost base stats and training that could be purchased for skills. However, I prefer to try and roleplay most things in a bit more organically than "you can buy a skill manual for X skill for Y amount of money". For instance, with feats in particular, I've had it where there was an evil mage in a character's backstory that they had been tracking for years. When they finally found this mage and killed them, they earned the Mage Slayer feat. Similar things with other characters- Inspiring Leader given for a lovely pep talk and speech before a large-scale battle, Mobile for a rogue that was always focused on darting around everywhere and finding the optimal position to strike from, Durable for the gnome that had recovered from being turned to stone by a Gorgon... my point being that I find it best to try and personalize things for the players and not make an attempt to generalize. The same concept works with skills- if a character has taken a great interest in studying the wilderness during downtime, a Nature proficiency might be awarded. That doesn't mean that they say they do this during downtime- they actively pursue it both during sessions and even ask me about it outside of sessions when they say that their character is doing the research. That said, if you do use a more organic strategy like this, make sure to make an attempt to evenly distribute things between players, and remember that some feats are just straight better than others so be wary of how you give out powerful feats.
That said, I think the DM Guide does say something about training during downtime to get weapon proficiency which could probably easily be modified (make it more expensive) to work with this stuff, but I personally love the more roleplay-based approach and my players seem to appreciate that the actions of their character have an impact on their stats.