As a GM, I'd much rather have characters with a high perception over those with a low perception.
As has been said above, when the characters notice something, it gives the players the tools they need to make decisions to move forward. Or to move sideways, depending on the plot.
If you're concerned that they find every clue you try to hide from them, then start leaving red herrings.
Eons ago, during the last ice age, when I was a child and video games came on these soft, plastic objects known as "Floppy Discs," they didn't have enough storage to have fully voiced, or even, full text descriptions of everything. The games Wasteland and Sentinel Worlds 1: Future Magic come to mind as examples (and the amazing Star Saga series was the ultimate example of this). They had "paragraph books" which had a collection of descriptions and other blocks of text that you would be directed to read at certain points. You were warned against reading the paragraphs out of context, or reading those that you weren't directed to read.
After I beat both games, I read the paragraph books and was introduced to an entirely different story than was present in the actual game. They were red herrings, used to pad out the books and confuse those who read them out of order.
Not everything the characters find has to be relevant to the plot. And not everything relevant to the plot has to be honest and clear. Sometimes, you can learn more from a lie than you can from the truth.
I do like the red herring angle :) Plus, the red herrings can end up being plot hooks if the party decides to actually investigate some of these "clues" :)
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So many DMs are bothered by their players ability to succeed. "I don't want my players to be able to find that" then don't have it there. Finding mundane traps should get easier as they go because the are getting more powerful.
On another note I think it's fair that noticing a trap has to be an active check, you can roll lower than your passive because it's easy to explain in the narrative "you are distracted by this other interesting thing"
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As a GM, I'd much rather have characters with a high perception over those with a low perception.
As has been said above, when the characters notice something, it gives the players the tools they need to make decisions to move forward. Or to move sideways, depending on the plot.
If you're concerned that they find every clue you try to hide from them, then start leaving red herrings.
Eons ago, during the last ice age, when I was a child and video games came on these soft, plastic objects known as "Floppy Discs," they didn't have enough storage to have fully voiced, or even, full text descriptions of everything. The games Wasteland and Sentinel Worlds 1: Future Magic come to mind as examples (and the amazing Star Saga series was the ultimate example of this). They had "paragraph books" which had a collection of descriptions and other blocks of text that you would be directed to read at certain points. You were warned against reading the paragraphs out of context, or reading those that you weren't directed to read.
After I beat both games, I read the paragraph books and was introduced to an entirely different story than was present in the actual game. They were red herrings, used to pad out the books and confuse those who read them out of order.
Not everything the characters find has to be relevant to the plot. And not everything relevant to the plot has to be honest and clear. Sometimes, you can learn more from a lie than you can from the truth.
I do like the red herring angle :) Plus, the red herrings can end up being plot hooks if the party decides to actually investigate some of these "clues" :)
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
So many DMs are bothered by their players ability to succeed. "I don't want my players to be able to find that" then don't have it there. Finding mundane traps should get easier as they go because the are getting more powerful.
On another note I think it's fair that noticing a trap has to be an active check, you can roll lower than your passive because it's easy to explain in the narrative "you are distracted by this other interesting thing"