So I don’t know if this is a thing in 5e, but coming from pathfinder, every monster was linked to a skill, so if you come across something, you can roll to see if you remember reading/learning about it. So like, dragons like gold, or beholders have eye rays.
Is there anything like that in 5e? If you ran across a mind flayer, what would you roll to know anything about it? What about a flumpf? A dragon? Just trying to make sure I get the skills right.
I don’t believe there is a specific skill tied to it, but a DM might call for a roll if you describe it well. What roll it might be would depend on what method you use to attempt to identify the creature.
For info about beats, humanoids, oozes, some giants, and most monstrosities and plants I usually use Nature; for magical creatures like dragons, constructs, aberrations, elementals, and most giants, undead and fey, as well as magical monstrosities and plants I usually use Arcana, for fiends, Celestials, and some fey and undead I use Religion. If all else fails I use History as a “general memory” check.
So I don’t know if this is a thing in 5e, but coming from pathfinder, every monster was linked to a skill, so if you come across something, you can roll to see if you remember reading/learning about it. So like, dragons like gold, or beholders have eye rays.
Is there anything like that in 5e? If you ran across a mind flayer, what would you roll to know anything about it? What about a flumpf? A dragon? Just trying to make sure I get the skills right.
No. That was around in 3.5 and hence is in Pathfinder, but 5E offers basically no guidance on how to use the Lore skills (Arcana, History, Nature, and Religion) to a) recognize a creature's type, accordingly b) figure out what a creature probably is, and then c) remember facts about this kind of creature. This one of numerous reasons that Intelligence is universally regarded as a dump-stat in 5E outside of casters that rely on it.
Here's what we have and how it correlates to your question:
While the Prime Material is a plane, this is just WOTC being lazy. Inhabitants of other planes are:
All fey (they're from the feywild), elementals (appropriate elemental/paralemental/quasielemental plane), celestials (most of the upper planes), fiends (most of the lower planes), effectively all oozes (they're native the Prime Material now, but allegedly 100% of them are actually Juiblex's leavings, and some of them have been subsequently modified by illithids or what-have-you)
The vast majority of aberrations are from the Far Realm, which is a plane, and of course Slaad are from Limbo, but there are also aberrations native to the Prime Material, like aboleths.
Giants with elemental immunities canonically wander - e.g. Frost Giants will wander about the Plane of Ice. Outside of them, though, giants generally stay on the Prime Material, outside of the servants of gods or that demon lord of frost giants dude.
Monstrosities are so random it will genuinely vary wildly. Examples of extraplanar monstrosities include Sorrowsworn and Leucrottas.
Very rarely humanoids (gith), constructs (modrons, certain constructs employed by fiends), dragons (e.g. shadow and moonlight), plants (plants from other planes generally have their types changed, but both the feywild and Zuggtmoy's layer of the Abyss have plants on them with their type intact)
Absolutely zero beasts (a beast from another plane generally has its type changed to celestial, fey, fiend, or monstrosity) outside of incredibly unique cases. The demon lord of beasts generally has a bunch of monstrosities and fiends, in terms of type, running around, for example.
Theoretically the Shadowfell is rife with undead and Ravenloft is inside it, but as a practical matter just about all undead you'll ever deal with are from the Prime Material, as almost all of them are made from beasts, humanoids, giants, dragons, and the occasional monstrosity. However, note that Orcus has a level of the Abyss stuffed with undead.
Because Arcana covers all magic, it should generally cover creatures that absolutely rely on magic to come into existence, which covers almost all constructs (Modrons excluded, although they'd be covered under planar knowledge), absolutely all undead, and theoretically absolutely all monstrosities (as they're defined by having been magically mutated from whatever they used to be).
That means history covers absolutely everything, provided it was of historical significance. This will usually include 100% of all humanoids, but absolutely anything capable of building a civilization (all giants, all dragons, monstrosities like the yuan-ti, aberrations like the aboleths, etc etc) or of doing anything of historical import (e.g. Demogorgon is quintessentially a legendary person) is covered here.
Explicitly plants and animals, but practically speaking also fey, elementals, and a wide array of monstrosities that have gone native (like owlbears). It's also weird if this doesn't cover biological aspects of humanoids, which are exactly as native to the prime material as beasts and plants - if you can remember an ape is an omnivore, you should be able to remember a human is, too.
If this doesn't cover all celestials and fiends your DM is being very weird. "Cults" gets you into weirder territory, since that all depends on what people have been worshipping.
As you can hopefully tell at a glance, by a fairly wide margin, the most reliable Lore skills going into a campaign blind are Arcana > History > Nature > Religion. But your DM has nothing beyond what I pasted in blue here in terms of guidance for picking a skill, let alone setting a DC to figure something out. Bear in mind you will usually use Perception, Investigation, and/or Insight to first figure out more or less what something is (hey, that guy has fangs and drinks blood, I suspect he's not a humanoid!) prior to rolling a lore check about what you think something is.
While the Prime Material is a plane, this is just WOTC being lazy. Inhabitants of other planes are:
All fey (they're from the feywild)….
That’s not entirely true. Any Fey PC can be a native of the Prime, so it stands to reason many other Fey creatures could also be Prime natives. Just sayin.’ I mostly agree with everything else you wrote, and the stuff I don’t agree with is just my personal preferences. But many Fey can objectively be Prime natives.
Broadly speaking (I rule case-by-case), knowing about natural creatures native to the material plane is Nature and knowing about created/engineered creatures or creatures native to other planes is Arcana. Anything I can think of off the top of my head from the Monster Manual would be covered at least in significant part by those two skill, but it'll also depend on what kind of information you're looking for. For example, I'd let a Religion roll provide some insight into the social hierarchies of angels if the angels in question are part of a particular religious structure, but to know whether or not they're immune to radiant damage, I'd require Arcana.
TCoE is your friend. There is a section called Parleying with Monsters. In that section there is a chart where each type of monster (i.e. monstrosities, celestials, fiends, etc.) is linked to a skill or skills. I use that table/chart to determine the skill my players need to roll to learn more about the creature.
As DM i usually rely on Intelligence (Arcana, History, Nature or Religion) check to identify monsters or recall lore about them, dépendant on its origin or type.
Thanks guys! I was thinking of adding a weapon into a game that (for lore reasons) in addition to normal bonuses gave people advantage on identifying/knowing about aberrations, (similar to the suggestion for an item in the core rulebook that suggests an item that gives advantage on athletics checks but only when swimming) but wanted to know specifically what skill to use! Really helpful! Thanks again!
TCoE is your friend. There is a section called Parleying with Monsters. In that section there is a chart where each type of monster (i.e. monstrosities, celestials, fiends, etc.) is linked to a skill or skills. I use that table/chart to determine the skill my players need to roll to learn more about the creature.
This is the same table I use for this purpose. Here it is.
Parleying With Monsters is more for finding what monsters desire rather than identifying what they are, and provides tables based on their types for that matter.
Monster Research: Adventurers can research what a creature is likely to desire.
If I want the monster to be mysterious then it doesn't matter what abilities and skills the characters have - no-one knows what the monster is.
GM: It's a strange blobby creature with four heads and a mass of tentacles for legs. Player: What is it? Can I roll <ability>? GM: Nope, you don't know what it is. Player: But I'm an expert <skill>. GM: Yes, you are and you still have no idea what the beast is, which is a clue that it's something very unusual.
What I want to happen is for the players to go and research the monster to advance the story. You know, a plot clue. What usually happens is that the players just sulk, "the GM never lets us use our skills." Then they complain that I never give them any clues as to where to go next. *Sigh*
If it doesn't matter, then I throw the decision back at the player. I'm not a fan of keeping stuff secret from players. What's the point of cool stuff if you never share it with them?
GM: It's a large bear with the head of an owl. Player: Cool, an owlbear! What does my character know about owlbears? GM: You tell me, it's your character.
When do the PCs learn about these creatures: during time of encounter?
Trying to see how this game mechanic would plays out during gameplay
I recommend you ask over in the DM Advice and Homebrew fora if you want to explore homebrewing a way to use Arcana/History/Nature/Religion to know more about creatures.
Xanathar's has rules for researching a creature ahead of time here, but said rules deeply violate the PHB because they use a raw Intelligence check to do research. If you want to stick with the PHB, you research a creature ahead of time using Investigate.
As as GM you have complete freedom in what skills you want to assign, as well as the DC. Sometimes you can allow more than one skill, each with the same DC or different DCs.
Examples of what skills (Ability Check really) may be able to do are listed in the rules under Using Each Ability. The rules here are intentionally vague/loose to give the GM complete control over how they want to run their game. Its fine to use previous editions as a guidepost, or even other RPGs, but please note these are simply choices and opinions, not hard facts that tie a GM down.
Matt Mercer is a great example. He often allows both Arcana and Religion checks for outer-planer monsters. Sometimes anyone might know, other times he requires the skill be trained. Sometimes a characters background might let them have an agility check, or just know.
One real question as a GM you should ask yourself is: How much do I want the characters to know? That helps you set a DC, or even tier of DCs. Often its great to give a hint, a taste of the flavor, at least to tantalize and perhaps a gem hidden if the roll is high enough.
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Remember there are Rules as Written (RAW), Rules as Intended (RAI), and Rules as Fun (RAF). There's some great RAW, RAI, and RAF here... please check in with your DM to determine how they want to adjudicate the RAW/RAI/RAF for your game.
A couple of thoughts - 1) there is a LOT of potential overlap on what skills to use so you may want to think about it not just from the skill point but from the character class(s) view. Take that owl ear - a mage might use arcana as it’s a magically created monstrosity, a ranger would be more likely to use nature as it’s now a standard danger in the wilderness. So what the character is will have a lot to do with what skills it uses for this. 2) there are a large number of things out there that have a certain amount of “renown” so that even if you’ve never actually seen one before you’ve heard of them all your life and pretty well know a fair bit about it just from common stories. Granted these could be wrong and you could be mistaking something relatively innocuous for something much more dangerous - “ that big eye and eyestalks it’s a beholder - RUN”, and it turns out to be a minor beholderkin instead. 3) your players should be keeping some sorts of records about what they have run into as well as they will know a lot more about the things they have experienced. This especially true if folks are bringing in PCs from other campaigns (something I’ve done many times over the last 40+years).
Nature for beasts, dragons, plants, oozes, monstrosities and humanoids, religion for devils, undead, demons and celestials, arcana for constructs, elementals, fey, and abberations (unless aberrations and unknown, then no roll).
These aren't detailed in the DMG, but this is what I use. They depend on my setting as well. Dragons may be arcana for instance, and elementals nature. Just do what makes sense to you in the moment and stay consistent.
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So I don’t know if this is a thing in 5e, but coming from pathfinder, every monster was linked to a skill, so if you come across something, you can roll to see if you remember reading/learning about it. So like, dragons like gold, or beholders have eye rays.
Is there anything like that in 5e? If you ran across a mind flayer, what would you roll to know anything about it? What about a flumpf? A dragon? Just trying to make sure I get the skills right.
I don’t believe there is a specific skill tied to it, but a DM might call for a roll if you describe it well. What roll it might be would depend on what method you use to attempt to identify the creature.
For info about beats, humanoids, oozes, some giants, and most monstrosities and plants I usually use Nature; for magical creatures like dragons, constructs, aberrations, elementals, and most giants, undead and fey, as well as magical monstrosities and plants I usually use Arcana, for fiends, Celestials, and some fey and undead I use Religion. If all else fails I use History as a “general memory” check.
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No. That was around in 3.5 and hence is in Pathfinder, but 5E offers basically no guidance on how to use the Lore skills (Arcana, History, Nature, and Religion) to a) recognize a creature's type, accordingly b) figure out what a creature probably is, and then c) remember facts about this kind of creature. This one of numerous reasons that Intelligence is universally regarded as a dump-stat in 5E outside of casters that rely on it.
Here's what we have and how it correlates to your question:
As you can hopefully tell at a glance, by a fairly wide margin, the most reliable Lore skills going into a campaign blind are Arcana > History > Nature > Religion. But your DM has nothing beyond what I pasted in blue here in terms of guidance for picking a skill, let alone setting a DC to figure something out. Bear in mind you will usually use Perception, Investigation, and/or Insight to first figure out more or less what something is (hey, that guy has fangs and drinks blood, I suspect he's not a humanoid!) prior to rolling a lore check about what you think something is.
That’s not entirely true. Any Fey PC can be a native of the Prime, so it stands to reason many other Fey creatures could also be Prime natives. Just sayin.’ I mostly agree with everything else you wrote, and the stuff I don’t agree with is just my personal preferences. But many Fey can objectively be Prime natives.
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Broadly speaking (I rule case-by-case), knowing about natural creatures native to the material plane is Nature and knowing about created/engineered creatures or creatures native to other planes is Arcana. Anything I can think of off the top of my head from the Monster Manual would be covered at least in significant part by those two skill, but it'll also depend on what kind of information you're looking for. For example, I'd let a Religion roll provide some insight into the social hierarchies of angels if the angels in question are part of a particular religious structure, but to know whether or not they're immune to radiant damage, I'd require Arcana.
A 3rd party book (Heliana's guide to monster hunting) assigned monster types to skills like so:
Aberration: Arcana
Beast: Survival
Celestial: Religion
Construct: Investigation
Dragon: Survival
Elemental: Arcana
Fey: Arcana
Fiend: Religion
Giant: Medicine
Humanoid: Medicine
Monstrosity: Survival
Ooze: Nature
Plant: Nature
Undead: Medicine
Of course this was for identifying useable materials from their bodies...
TCoE is your friend. There is a section called Parleying with Monsters. In that section there is a chart where each type of monster (i.e. monstrosities, celestials, fiends, etc.) is linked to a skill or skills. I use that table/chart to determine the skill my players need to roll to learn more about the creature.
Dungeonmastering since 1992!
As DM i usually rely on Intelligence (Arcana, History, Nature or Religion) check to identify monsters or recall lore about them, dépendant on its origin or type.
Thanks guys! I was thinking of adding a weapon into a game that (for lore reasons) in addition to normal bonuses gave people advantage on identifying/knowing about aberrations, (similar to the suggestion for an item in the core rulebook that suggests an item that gives advantage on athletics checks but only when swimming) but wanted to know specifically what skill to use! Really helpful! Thanks again!
This is the same table I use for this purpose. Here it is.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
Parleying With Monsters is more for finding what monsters desire rather than identifying what they are, and provides tables based on their types for that matter.
I get that. I'm just saying there's no reason those skills can't be the ones used for research as well.
Dungeonmastering since 1992!
If I want the monster to be mysterious then it doesn't matter what abilities and skills the characters have - no-one knows what the monster is.
GM: It's a strange blobby creature with four heads and a mass of tentacles for legs.
Player: What is it? Can I roll <ability>?
GM: Nope, you don't know what it is.
Player: But I'm an expert <skill>.
GM: Yes, you are and you still have no idea what the beast is, which is a clue that it's something very unusual.
What I want to happen is for the players to go and research the monster to advance the story. You know, a plot clue. What usually happens is that the players just sulk, "the GM never lets us use our skills." Then they complain that I never give them any clues as to where to go next. *Sigh*
If it doesn't matter, then I throw the decision back at the player. I'm not a fan of keeping stuff secret from players. What's the point of cool stuff if you never share it with them?
GM: It's a large bear with the head of an owl.
Player: Cool, an owlbear! What does my character know about owlbears?
GM: You tell me, it's your character.
When do the PCs learn about these creatures: during time of encounter?
Trying to see how this game mechanic would plays out during gameplay
I recommend you ask over in the DM Advice and Homebrew fora if you want to explore homebrewing a way to use Arcana/History/Nature/Religion to know more about creatures.
Xanathar's has rules for researching a creature ahead of time here, but said rules deeply violate the PHB because they use a raw Intelligence check to do research. If you want to stick with the PHB, you research a creature ahead of time using Investigate.
As as GM you have complete freedom in what skills you want to assign, as well as the DC. Sometimes you can allow more than one skill, each with the same DC or different DCs.
Examples of what skills (Ability Check really) may be able to do are listed in the rules under Using Each Ability. The rules here are intentionally vague/loose to give the GM complete control over how they want to run their game. Its fine to use previous editions as a guidepost, or even other RPGs, but please note these are simply choices and opinions, not hard facts that tie a GM down.
Matt Mercer is a great example. He often allows both Arcana and Religion checks for outer-planer monsters. Sometimes anyone might know, other times he requires the skill be trained. Sometimes a characters background might let them have an agility check, or just know.
One real question as a GM you should ask yourself is: How much do I want the characters to know? That helps you set a DC, or even tier of DCs. Often its great to give a hint, a taste of the flavor, at least to tantalize and perhaps a gem hidden if the roll is high enough.
Remember there are Rules as Written (RAW), Rules as Intended (RAI), and Rules as Fun (RAF). There's some great RAW, RAI, and RAF here... please check in with your DM to determine how they want to adjudicate the RAW/RAI/RAF for your game.
I still think the guidance from the parley rule above applies just as well to attempts to recognize different types of monsters.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
A couple of thoughts -
1) there is a LOT of potential overlap on what skills to use so you may want to think about it not just from the skill point but from the character class(s) view. Take that owl ear - a mage might use arcana as it’s a magically created monstrosity, a ranger would be more likely to use nature as it’s now a standard danger in the wilderness. So what the character is will have a lot to do with what skills it uses for this.
2) there are a large number of things out there that have a certain amount of “renown” so that even if you’ve never actually seen one before you’ve heard of them all your life and pretty well know a fair bit about it just from common stories. Granted these could be wrong and you could be mistaking something relatively innocuous for something much more dangerous - “ that big eye and eyestalks it’s a beholder - RUN”, and it turns out to be a minor beholderkin instead.
3) your players should be keeping some sorts of records about what they have run into as well as they will know a lot more about the things they have experienced. This especially true if folks are bringing in PCs from other campaigns (something I’ve done many times over the last 40+years).
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
Nature for beasts, dragons, plants, oozes, monstrosities and humanoids, religion for devils, undead, demons and celestials, arcana for constructs, elementals, fey, and abberations (unless aberrations and unknown, then no roll).
These aren't detailed in the DMG, but this is what I use. They depend on my setting as well. Dragons may be arcana for instance, and elementals nature. Just do what makes sense to you in the moment and stay consistent.