It is not uncommon for me to use 100% damage on a fail 50% on a pass when a high level group is disarming an equally high level trap.
Pushing a given DC to 30 is also not an issue (assuming +13, + (2) Guidance - its still a 25% chance of success .. make that 50% if they are being assisted). However the tedium of wasting 20min of a 4 hour hour session on picking the lock on the chest after you killed the XYZ whatever or on the door to get to the XYZ whatever I do not think is an enjoyable mechanic for the players or DM.
Now I have had a high level rogue jump on a dragons back and try to stab them to death - the dc for staying on while the dragon did a barrel roll was very high indeed lol.
The main thing with this discussion about skills here is that we have made it a foregone conclusion that in all cases, the maximum possible bonus with spell benefits is always available when making skill checks when in practice this simply is statistically rarely going to be the case.
I mean you jump on a Dragons back... the question is.. who are you? How is your acrobatics skill? The majority of characters are not going to have X skill matched up with Y attribute for Z situation and the luxury or A, B and C spell effects to provide them with the best possible bonus and if that does happen to be the case... well then yeah, they should have a high degree of success and I think that is quite alright. Why challenge the idea that a well-prepared group that planned well has a high probability of success? If preparation and planning didn't create odds in your favor, I would imagine most people would think the game was broken.
I like to use 3d6 to just raise the difficult of the game in general as a whole, but I don't think the default game is easy... Its very circumstantial and quite often your rolling dice with 0 chance of success, in fact I would argue, most of the time players are rolling skill checks with the odds not in their favor because most players are not well prepared and do not plan well. I find, at least in my gaming group when they face a difficult DC almost certainly they are going to fail less so because the DC is high and more so because they did almost nothing to improve their odds.
I think the biggest issue with expertise is that it was so broken they had to give it to other classes to make up for how broken it is. Like the rogue player could exceed at survival better than the ranger, so now the ranger needs expertise.
Any class with expertise is going to be able to sneak far better than any other class. The argument that it's because you get better with time doesn't really make sense when you consider that (1) most classes get expertise at low levels and (2) the fighter, paladin, etc who has also been sneaking around the entire time doesn't get it. You can still get oddities where a ranger or rogue might be better at arcana than a sorcerer, warlock, or another class where it would make more sense.
The main thing with this discussion about skills here is that we have made it a foregone conclusion that in all cases, the maximum possible bonus with spell benefits is always available when making skill checks when in practice this simply is statistically rarely going to be the case.
No-one is making that conclusion; actual maxed out bonuses are way higher than has been discussed in this thread (without magic items or multiple level 19+ feats, it's still possible to hit a DC of 60+ -- say, level 20 battle master with expertise from a feat and a stat of 20, being boosted by a superiority die, guidance, and a bardic inspiration die, total 1d20+5+12+1d12+1d12+1d4 = 21-65). The issue is that there should be tasks that are hard enough that someone with a reasonable investment in being a master of that skill feels a sense of accomplishment for doing it.
The main thing with this discussion about skills here is that we have made it a foregone conclusion that in all cases, the maximum possible bonus with spell benefits is always available when making skill checks when in practice this simply is statistically rarely going to be the case.
No-one is making that conclusion; actual maxed out bonuses are way higher than has been discussed in this thread (without magic items or multiple level 19+ feats, it's still possible to hit a DC of 60+ -- say, level 20 battle master with expertise from a feat and a stat of 20, being boosted by a superiority die, guidance, and a bardic inspiration die, total 1d20+5+12+1d12+1d12+1d4 = 21-65). The issue is that there should be tasks that are hard enough that someone with a reasonable investment in being a master of that skill feels a sense of accomplishment for doing it.
Well that is truly an outlier case imo - that said the average roll on those dice is ~41 If there is a case where a skill check comes up and the fates align that way for the party I do not have an issue with it. I think a far more common scenario is - caster types here's guidance do the arcana check - perception folks here is guidance do the perception check and so on - I think there is a happy middle ground where most groups live where they are not totally min maxing every die roll - at the same time they do understand its better to have the wizard with proficiency in Arcana do the check as opposed to the fighter.
In the case of my dragon rider he was a l15 rogue with 20 Dex and proficiency in acrobatics and sleight of hand so whether I made it hang on or stay on he had a chance to succeed - I think I made it a 30 as I recall and he rolled a nat 20 hah - basically take that Mr. DM lol it was awesome.
I think the biggest issue with expertise is that it was so broken they had to give it to other classes to make up for how broken it is. Like the rogue player could exceed at survival better than the ranger, so now the ranger needs expertise.
Any class with expertise is going to be able to sneak far better than any other class. The argument that it's because you get better with time doesn't really make sense when you consider that (1) most classes get expertise at low levels and (2) the fighter, paladin, etc who has also been sneaking around the entire time doesn't get it. You can still get oddities where a ranger or rogue might be better at arcana than a sorcerer, warlock, or another class where it would make more sense.
Absolutely this. They would never give a class double their proficency bonus to their weapon attack and not see that it breaks the bounded accuracy. But skills as a game mechanic are so lazily dealt with this happens. It's frustrating for a DM who wants to say there is more ways to win the game than with a sword, but doens't want to adjudicate every risk taken with a "DM may I?" game of deciding which player is clever and which one isn't it.
I think the biggest issue with expertise is that it was so broken they had to give it to other classes to make up for how broken it is. Like the rogue player could exceed at survival better than the ranger, so now the ranger needs expertise.
Any class with expertise is going to be able to sneak far better than any other class. The argument that it's because you get better with time doesn't really make sense when you consider that (1) most classes get expertise at low levels and (2) the fighter, paladin, etc who has also been sneaking around the entire time doesn't get it. You can still get oddities where a ranger or rogue might be better at arcana than a sorcerer, warlock, or another class where it would make more sense.
Absolutely this. They would never give a class double their proficency bonus to their weapon attack and not see that it breaks the bounded accuracy. But skills as a game mechanic are so lazily dealt with this happens. It's frustrating for a DM who wants to say there is more ways to win the game than with a sword, but doens't want to adjudicate every risk taken with a "DM may I?" game of deciding which player is clever and which one isn't it.
This is my least favorite aspect of the way the skill system is setup and is probably one of the stronger arguments for a stronger class-skill connection and/or a classless system. In 3e for example we had the class-cross class system which handled this a lot better with a broader skill tree to allow players to distinguish their archetype more with the skill system.
To me expertise is fine as a concept, as long as we agree for example that only a Wizard can get Expertise in Arcana, a Ranger is the only one that can get survival and a Rogue is the only who can get stealth. The idea of "pick your own" is really the only problem with it.
This however is a symptom of a larger problem with the game and really with the culture of the game where we have gone so far away from class archetyping and the concept of "freedom of customization", rather than "freedom of choice" that there is no longer such a thing as a class with a purpose or reason to choose one class over another narratively. A Wizard is no longer the "mage" of the group as an archetype or a narrative concept, they are really not any better at magic than any number of a dozen other class-sub-class combos, they do not have any special knowledge about magic or advantage that any other class can't get. Its really it's just ...another of many ways to be a mage, there is nothing particularly meaningful about the choice.
The same is true about all classes, wether its being a martial warrior, a sneaky rogue or a wilderness ranger. You don't actually have to pick the class that you might assign the attributes of the archetype to that class. Like there is nothing special about being a Fighter, if you want to be a kick ass "warrior", you can pick any number of class-sub-class combos to be that.
Skills fall into the same principle, they are a kind of meaningless mechanical mathematics, and there is nothing particularly narrative or meaningful about them.. anyone can be anything.
I think a far more common scenario is - caster types here's guidance do the arcana check - perception folks here is guidance do the perception check and so on - I think there is a happy middle ground where most groups live where they are not totally min maxing every die roll - at the same time they do understand its better to have the wizard with proficiency in Arcana do the check as opposed to the fighter.
In baseline 2014 maybe. But not in 2024. In 2024 every class (except Monk, Warlock, and Sorcerer) has something that buffs their skill checks beyond simply proficiency.
Barbarians can use Rage to add their strength and have advantage on a significant number of skills and get additional skill proficiencies. Fighters can add second wind to any skill check Druid and Clerics get Guidance which can be added to any skill check by any character Bards get Expertise and BI (which lasts an hour) Rogues get Expertise and Reliable Talent now at level 7 Wizards get Expertise in a skill Rangers get Expertise in a skill
Wild Magic Sorcerers can give themselves advantage and/or give other players a +1d4.
Plus using tools gives advantage, and the Help action gives advantage. There is also a feat that gives expertise and a background feat that gives skill proficiencies
If we only consider a 2024 Rogue, it's not at all difficult to get proficiency in 10/18 skills at level 1 (1 from species, 2 from background, 4 from class, 3 from Skilled background feat). All of which they can't roll lower than a 10 on at level 7, and they get 4 skills with Expertise.
I think the biggest issue with expertise is that it was so broken they had to give it to other classes to make up for how broken it is. Like the rogue player could exceed at survival better than the ranger, so now the ranger needs expertise.
Any class with expertise is going to be able to sneak far better than any other class. The argument that it's because you get better with time doesn't really make sense when you consider that (1) most classes get expertise at low levels and (2) the fighter, paladin, etc who has also been sneaking around the entire time doesn't get it. You can still get oddities where a ranger or rogue might be better at arcana than a sorcerer, warlock, or another class where it would make more sense.
Absolutely this. They would never give a class double their proficency bonus to their weapon attack and not see that it breaks the bounded accuracy. But skills as a game mechanic are so lazily dealt with this happens. It's frustrating for a DM who wants to say there is more ways to win the game than with a sword, but doens't want to adjudicate every risk taken with a "DM may I?" game of deciding which player is clever and which one isn't it.
This is my least favorite aspect of the way the skill system is setup and is probably one of the stronger arguments for a stronger class-skill connection and/or a classless system. In 3e for example we had the class-cross class system which handled this a lot better with a broader skill tree to allow players to distinguish their archetype more with the skill system.
To me expertise is fine as a concept, as long as we agree for example that only a Wizard can get Expertise in Arcana, a Ranger is the only one that can get survival and a Rogue is the only who can get stealth. The idea of "pick your own" is really the only problem with it.
This however is a symptom of a larger problem with the game and really with the culture of the game where we have gone so far away from class archetyping and the concept of "freedom of customization", rather than "freedom of choice" that there is no longer such a thing as a class with a purpose or reason to choose one class over another narratively. A Wizard is no longer the "mage" of the group as an archetype or a narrative concept, they are really not any better at magic than any number of a dozen other class-sub-class combos, they do not have any special knowledge about magic or advantage that any other class can't get. Its really it's just ...another of many ways to be a mage, there is nothing particularly meaningful about the choice.
The same is true about all classes, wether its being a martial warrior, a sneaky rogue or a wilderness ranger. You don't actually have to pick the class that you might assign the attributes of the archetype to that class. Like there is nothing special about being a Fighter, if you want to be a kick ass "warrior", you can pick any number of class-sub-class combos to be that.
Skills fall into the same principle, they are a kind of meaningless mechanical mathematics, and there is nothing particularly narrative or meaningful about them.. anyone can be anything.
Interesting that you mention that, I made a Level 14 Bladesong NPC and quickly realized that he might be better than a fighter. Once he activates bladesong, he has 20 AC and can easily cast shield to raise that AC to 25, and can give himself additional damage on each attack, he also ended up with advantage on concentration checks and can lower the damage he takes. He wasn't optimized or anything and his spell selection was not carefully thought out, because I didn't anticipate having need of him using those spells. I just needed to know how often he could cast certain spells, and have a general idea of his capabilities.
I think a far more common scenario is - caster types here's guidance do the arcana check - perception folks here is guidance do the perception check and so on - I think there is a happy middle ground where most groups live where they are not totally min maxing every die roll - at the same time they do understand its better to have the wizard with proficiency in Arcana do the check as opposed to the fighter.
In baseline 2014 maybe. But not in 2024. In 2024 every class (except Monk, Warlock, and Sorcerer) has something that buffs their skill checks beyond simply proficiency.
Barbarians can use Rage to add their strength and have advantage on a significant number of skills and get additional skill proficiencies. Fighters can add second wind to any skill check Druid and Clerics get Guidance which can be added to any skill check by any character Bards get Expertise and BI (which lasts an hour) Rogues get Expertise and Reliable Talent now at level 7 Wizards get Expertise in a skill Rangers get Expertise in a skill
Wild Magic Sorcerers can give themselves advantage and/or give other players a +1d4.
Plus using tools gives advantage, and the Help action gives advantage. There is also a feat that gives expertise and a background feat that gives skill proficiencies
If we only consider a 2024 Rogue, it's not at all difficult to get proficiency in 10/18 skills at level 1 (1 from species, 2 from background, 4 from class, 3 from Skilled background feat). All of which they can't roll lower than a 10 on at level 7, and they get 4 skills with Expertise.
I think a far more common scenario is - caster types here's guidance do the arcana check - perception folks here is guidance do the perception check and so on - I think there is a happy middle ground where most groups live where they are not totally min maxing every die roll - at the same time they do understand its better to have the wizard with proficiency in Arcana do the check as opposed to the fighter.
In baseline 2014 maybe. But not in 2024. In 2024 every class (except Monk, Warlock, and Sorcerer) has something that buffs their skill checks beyond simply proficiency.
Barbarians can use Rage to add their strength and have advantage on a significant number of skills and get additional skill proficiencies. Fighters can add second wind to any skill check Druid and Clerics get Guidance which can be added to any skill check by any character Bards get Expertise and BI (which lasts an hour) Rogues get Expertise and Reliable Talent now at level 7 Wizards get Expertise in a skill Rangers get Expertise in a skill
Wild Magic Sorcerers can give themselves advantage and/or give other players a +1d4.
Plus using tools gives advantage, and the Help action gives advantage. There is also a feat that gives expertise and a background feat that gives skill proficiencies
If we only consider a 2024 Rogue, it's not at all difficult to get proficiency in 10/18 skills at level 1 (1 from species, 2 from background, 4 from class, 3 from Skilled background feat). All of which they can't roll lower than a 10 on at level 7, and they get 4 skills with Expertise.
I think a far more common scenario is - caster types here's guidance do the arcana check - perception folks here is guidance do the perception check and so on - I think there is a happy middle ground where most groups live where they are not totally min maxing every die roll - at the same time they do understand its better to have the wizard with proficiency in Arcana do the check as opposed to the fighter.
In baseline 2014 maybe. But not in 2024. In 2024 every class (except Monk, Warlock, and Sorcerer) has something that buffs their skill checks beyond simply proficiency.
Barbarians can use Rage to add their strength and have advantage on a significant number of skills and get additional skill proficiencies. Fighters can add second wind to any skill check Druid and Clerics get Guidance which can be added to any skill check by any character Bards get Expertise and BI (which lasts an hour) Rogues get Expertise and Reliable Talent now at level 7 Wizards get Expertise in a skill Rangers get Expertise in a skill
Wild Magic Sorcerers can give themselves advantage and/or give other players a +1d4.
Plus using tools gives advantage, and the Help action gives advantage. There is also a feat that gives expertise and a background feat that gives skill proficiencies
If we only consider a 2024 Rogue, it's not at all difficult to get proficiency in 10/18 skills at level 1 (1 from species, 2 from background, 4 from class, 3 from Skilled background feat). All of which they can't roll lower than a 10 on at level 7, and they get 4 skills with Expertise.
In most cases Reliable talent is going to make the Rogue better than other classes in skills they shouldn't be better in.
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It is not uncommon for me to use 100% damage on a fail 50% on a pass when a high level group is disarming an equally high level trap.
Pushing a given DC to 30 is also not an issue (assuming +13, + (2) Guidance - its still a 25% chance of success .. make that 50% if they are being assisted). However the tedium of wasting 20min of a 4 hour hour session on picking the lock on the chest after you killed the XYZ whatever or on the door to get to the XYZ whatever I do not think is an enjoyable mechanic for the players or DM.
Now I have had a high level rogue jump on a dragons back and try to stab them to death - the dc for staying on while the dragon did a barrel roll was very high indeed lol.
The main thing with this discussion about skills here is that we have made it a foregone conclusion that in all cases, the maximum possible bonus with spell benefits is always available when making skill checks when in practice this simply is statistically rarely going to be the case.
I mean you jump on a Dragons back... the question is.. who are you? How is your acrobatics skill? The majority of characters are not going to have X skill matched up with Y attribute for Z situation and the luxury or A, B and C spell effects to provide them with the best possible bonus and if that does happen to be the case... well then yeah, they should have a high degree of success and I think that is quite alright. Why challenge the idea that a well-prepared group that planned well has a high probability of success? If preparation and planning didn't create odds in your favor, I would imagine most people would think the game was broken.
I like to use 3d6 to just raise the difficult of the game in general as a whole, but I don't think the default game is easy... Its very circumstantial and quite often your rolling dice with 0 chance of success, in fact I would argue, most of the time players are rolling skill checks with the odds not in their favor because most players are not well prepared and do not plan well. I find, at least in my gaming group when they face a difficult DC almost certainly they are going to fail less so because the DC is high and more so because they did almost nothing to improve their odds.
I think the biggest issue with expertise is that it was so broken they had to give it to other classes to make up for how broken it is. Like the rogue player could exceed at survival better than the ranger, so now the ranger needs expertise.
Any class with expertise is going to be able to sneak far better than any other class. The argument that it's because you get better with time doesn't really make sense when you consider that (1) most classes get expertise at low levels and (2) the fighter, paladin, etc who has also been sneaking around the entire time doesn't get it. You can still get oddities where a ranger or rogue might be better at arcana than a sorcerer, warlock, or another class where it would make more sense.
No-one is making that conclusion; actual maxed out bonuses are way higher than has been discussed in this thread (without magic items or multiple level 19+ feats, it's still possible to hit a DC of 60+ -- say, level 20 battle master with expertise from a feat and a stat of 20, being boosted by a superiority die, guidance, and a bardic inspiration die, total 1d20+5+12+1d12+1d12+1d4 = 21-65). The issue is that there should be tasks that are hard enough that someone with a reasonable investment in being a master of that skill feels a sense of accomplishment for doing it.
Well that is truly an outlier case imo - that said the average roll on those dice is ~41 If there is a case where a skill check comes up and the fates align that way for the party I do not have an issue with it. I think a far more common scenario is - caster types here's guidance do the arcana check - perception folks here is guidance do the perception check and so on - I think there is a happy middle ground where most groups live where they are not totally min maxing every die roll - at the same time they do understand its better to have the wizard with proficiency in Arcana do the check as opposed to the fighter.
In the case of my dragon rider he was a l15 rogue with 20 Dex and proficiency in acrobatics and sleight of hand so whether I made it hang on or stay on he had a chance to succeed - I think I made it a 30 as I recall and he rolled a nat 20 hah - basically take that Mr. DM lol it was awesome.
Absolutely this. They would never give a class double their proficency bonus to their weapon attack and not see that it breaks the bounded accuracy. But skills as a game mechanic are so lazily dealt with this happens. It's frustrating for a DM who wants to say there is more ways to win the game than with a sword, but doens't want to adjudicate every risk taken with a "DM may I?" game of deciding which player is clever and which one isn't it.
This is my least favorite aspect of the way the skill system is setup and is probably one of the stronger arguments for a stronger class-skill connection and/or a classless system. In 3e for example we had the class-cross class system which handled this a lot better with a broader skill tree to allow players to distinguish their archetype more with the skill system.
To me expertise is fine as a concept, as long as we agree for example that only a Wizard can get Expertise in Arcana, a Ranger is the only one that can get survival and a Rogue is the only who can get stealth. The idea of "pick your own" is really the only problem with it.
This however is a symptom of a larger problem with the game and really with the culture of the game where we have gone so far away from class archetyping and the concept of "freedom of customization", rather than "freedom of choice" that there is no longer such a thing as a class with a purpose or reason to choose one class over another narratively. A Wizard is no longer the "mage" of the group as an archetype or a narrative concept, they are really not any better at magic than any number of a dozen other class-sub-class combos, they do not have any special knowledge about magic or advantage that any other class can't get. Its really it's just ...another of many ways to be a mage, there is nothing particularly meaningful about the choice.
The same is true about all classes, wether its being a martial warrior, a sneaky rogue or a wilderness ranger. You don't actually have to pick the class that you might assign the attributes of the archetype to that class. Like there is nothing special about being a Fighter, if you want to be a kick ass "warrior", you can pick any number of class-sub-class combos to be that.
Skills fall into the same principle, they are a kind of meaningless mechanical mathematics, and there is nothing particularly narrative or meaningful about them.. anyone can be anything.
In baseline 2014 maybe. But not in 2024. In 2024 every class (except Monk, Warlock, and Sorcerer) has something that buffs their skill checks beyond simply proficiency.
Barbarians can use Rage to add their strength and have advantage on a significant number of skills and get additional skill proficiencies.
Fighters can add second wind to any skill check
Druid and Clerics get Guidance which can be added to any skill check by any character
Bards get Expertise and BI (which lasts an hour)
Rogues get Expertise and Reliable Talent now at level 7
Wizards get Expertise in a skill
Rangers get Expertise in a skill
Wild Magic Sorcerers can give themselves advantage and/or give other players a +1d4.
Plus using tools gives advantage, and the Help action gives advantage.
There is also a feat that gives expertise and a background feat that gives skill proficiencies
If we only consider a 2024 Rogue, it's not at all difficult to get proficiency in 10/18 skills at level 1 (1 from species, 2 from background, 4 from class, 3 from Skilled background feat). All of which they can't roll lower than a 10 on at level 7, and they get 4 skills with Expertise.
Interesting that you mention that, I made a Level 14 Bladesong NPC and quickly realized that he might be better than a fighter. Once he activates bladesong, he has 20 AC and can easily cast shield to raise that AC to 25, and can give himself additional damage on each attack, he also ended up with advantage on concentration checks and can lower the damage he takes. He wasn't optimized or anything and his spell selection was not carefully thought out, because I didn't anticipate having need of him using those spells. I just needed to know how often he could cast certain spells, and have a general idea of his capabilities.
In most cases Reliable talent is going to make the Rogue better than other classes in skills they shouldn't be better in.