A key thing to remember about skill checks is: if there's no meaningful cost to trying, and no penalty for failing, there's really no reason to roll in the first place; just tell people they succeed (or that it's impossible). "I'm going to waste (important resource)" is already plenty to discourage people from keeping rolling hoping for a 20.
As I have said before, it isn't always so binary with skills. With Saves and Attacks rolls, it is very much "Hit or Miss", but with Skills, sometimes it about how well you succeed or bad you failed. If you like the idea that there is a nothing but a yes or no answer to Skill checks, that is fine. I and those I play the game with just don't agree. Everyone should fill out the survey based on their own desires for the game after all, that is what the playtest and survey are for.
Yeah, in general, I don't agree with the "if there's no way for them to succeed, don't have them roll" school of thought. While we can probably all agree on not rolling for utterly ridiculous things ("I attempt to jump to the moon!"), most attempts at skill or ability checks aren't quite that farfetched. And it can be a piece of worldbuilding, or a clue, if the player rolls an adjusted 23 (or 27) and fails. It tells them something, rather than just being a yes/no/you cannot succeed - especially if all previous similar checks were significantly less (or more) difficult.
In another RPG I play, the rule is that you only rule of the result is in question and meaningful. If you're going to get the same result regardless of how they roll, then you don't roll - otherwise, you do roll. Note, that never mentioned anything about success. The roll just has to be meaningful - in other words, you are looking to resolve a situation and how they roll will effect the end result.
If rolling a 20 or a 1 ends up with the same result, then you don't roll. If they end up with different results, even if it's just different modes of failure - say, the difference between no additional negative consequences and the characters getting their backsides whooped - then roll, assuming the likelihood of both options is high enough.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
A key thing to remember about skill checks is: if there's no meaningful cost to trying, and no penalty for failing, there's really no reason to roll in the first place; just tell people they succeed (or that it's impossible). "I'm going to waste (important resource)" is already plenty to discourage people from keeping rolling hoping for a 20.
As I have said before, it isn't always so binary with skills. With Saves and Attacks rolls, it is very much "Hit or Miss", but with Skills, sometimes it about how well you succeed or bad you failed. If you like the idea that there is a nothing but a yes or no answer to Skill checks, that is fine. I and those I play the game with just don't agree. Everyone should fill out the survey based on their own desires for the game after all, that is what the playtest and survey are for.
No but to say that the best of the best never fails does make it binary. It just will always be success. My Rogue gets a +10 on Acrobatics skill checks. He is going to succeed most skill checks. A 20 means he does it perfectly. A 1 means he falls flat on his face. Everything in between is that non-binary part you are talking about.
The non-binary part should be having skill checks more difficult than DC 10. If your rogue has +10 to the roll and the DM is still having him make DC 10 checks then that's a failure on the DMs part imo. If you need a gradient for success it's still there. If he only barely beats the check he manages to do whatever easy acrobatics feat you're requiring him to do (because DC 10 is explicitly an easy feat) but does it sloppily. If you're expecting him to be able to reasonably fail it you should give a harder check than 10. Simple as that.
I think the way I'd change how this works with skill checks would be to base it on proficiency. Skill Check without proficiency? The Nat 1 Rule is in play; you might be naturally strong, with a +5 to athletics, but you haven't studied lifting techniques or proper breath control that would help you lift that boulder, so there's a chance you'll goof it. Skill Check with proficiency? Nat 20 Rule is a go; you've studied how to step silently and blend in with the environment, so you at least safeguard your attempt with the basics, even if you've only got a +1.
In roughly a week we will be able to fill out the survey and give our feedback. I know what mine will be. It will be interesting to see what comes out the other side of all this.
you say character 1 and 3 feel like crap, I think you mean player and sorry, you are playing a game based on dice rolls, sometimes the dice roll against you and my experiance every time it happens is the players laugh about it and love the unexpected story beat it throws up.
It is based on dice rolls and modifiers. If the modifiers are enough to succeed on a nat 1, which takes investment, then the player should be allowed to succeed on a nat 1, Save or Ability Check.
If someone built a character to get modifiers high enough to do so, chances are that they are not going to find that 5% auto fail negating their investment to be fun, at least from my experience.
Current 5E RAW and RAI let you succeed on a nat 1 if your modifiers are high enough and it works well.
I have been running nat 1 auto fail for years and my tables know it, they like that there is a chance that they might fail at something they are good at because that is realistic. I don't insist on a dice rolls all the time but now and again I will and, when that 1 turns up, the party laugh and love it, I don't run that 20's auto succeed but I do let 20's usually do something cool for an ability check.
When you get to the higher levels of the game you need an element of that chance of failure still there, otherwise the game loses a lot of it's challenge. I can't just keep increasing lock pick DC scores, the locks of the world get harder as you level up.
Just because someone can succeed at some rolls on a nat 1 doesn't mean they will succeed at all rolls on a nat 1. My group just went through a mindflayer colony at 16th level and my Int Save was high enough to autosave against the mindblast. Still was one of the most challenging dungeon crawls I have ever went through.
It is fine for players to autosucceed at tasks. Hell, your example with a lock, a rogue with expertise is supposed to do that. Reliable Talent replaces any roll of 9 or lower with a 10 if they are proficient, this includes nat 1's so a rogue with reliable talent will never roll a nat 1 if they are proficient. At levels 13+, a rogue can easily have a minimum roll of 25 with thieves tools; add on gloves of thievery and it becomes a minimum roll of 30 while never being able to roll a nat 1 and thus never failing at this task.
However, they can fail at other tasks. An enemy hits the rogue with a strength save? Probably going to fail with that 8 str and no proficiency.
I feel like this shows you have clearly never played in a game with this rule. Because the players feeling like crap isn't what actually happens. What actually happens is laughter erupts at the table over the bad luck. Char1 Is down hardened at first "ok you guys got me." ... "wow wow wow, we could still roll 1's". Second player 10 "ah ha." Third player Nat 1. Whole table erupts in laughter. "NAT 1 BABY LETS GO!" "I can't believe we both rolled nat 1's." This is what legitimately happens at the table and they tell stories about it with their other DnD friends.
I run a Fantasy Flight Games Star Wars game. The dice have a triumph side and a Despair side. Now Triumph does not mean auto success nor does Despair mean auto fail on a check, but Triumph guarantees something good happens with the check, and Despairs guarantees something bad happens with the check. The despairs are as much fun as the triumphs. Sometimes because they are dreaded, sometimes because they are funny. Always because they add drama to the roll.
Just because your table likes autofail on nat 1's doesn't mean others do. Definitely also does not mean they never played with auto fail on Nat 1's. My group used to and we stopped when we learned it was not RAW nor RAI because it just felt miserable to fail when your modifier exceeded the DC. We didn't laugh about it, we straight up did not find it fun.
Fun fact: Unless you build a character that can succeed on a nat 1, by RAW, the auto fail rule does nothing to hinder you as you would have failed on a Nat 1 anyway. Conversely, the auto success portion of a nat 20 by RAW is meaningless if you had the modifiers to succeed on a nat 1.
I play in 3 different groups and they have all kind of had the same response to nat 1's, but that is probably just the type of people I attract. It is a different strokes for different folks kind of thing. As far as I am concerned it could be an optional rule and it would be fine. People play this way regardless.
As a DM I won't be using this rule ever, I'll be sticking with how it is now and deciding if something special happens on a nat 20 depending on the check and the circumstances.
1 being an auto fail is IMO the worst part of this. You have expertise? A +15 modifier and spent years (maybe hundreds) training this skill. Yeah sorry, now you're going to fail 5% of the time at something you deliberately built your character to be good at. No thanks.
The biggest problem I see with this is contested skill checks (Of various kinds that you may want to do for various reasons) Here's an example of something that could happen at the table, I've labelled them Chars but they could be Monsters/PCS/NPCs.
Char1 tells a lie, they roll 1 on deception but have a +12 modifier. Do the others even need to roll? Well yes, because they could also get a 1 and auto fail at their insight. Char2 rolls insight and rolls a 10 with no plus, they know Char 1 is lying despite Char1 having the higher total score. Char3 rolls insight too, they are an expert at it and have a plus 12 but also roll a 1 so they don't know Char1 was lying despite meeting their total of 13.
Char1 feels like crap, they were caught in a lie by Char2 that Char2 wouldn't previously have been able to tell. Char3 feels like crap, they were unable to tell that Char1 was lying even though their character is an expert and they met the total that was required - to make this worse they'll feel bad that Char2 detected the lie despite them not being particularly good at this usually and having no investment at all into the skill. Char2 is probably the only one feeling ok about this situation - But they aren't going to feel great because they did something great, they didn't really succeed, Char1 failed, it's not the same thing. So... Yay?
I feel like this shows you have clearly never played in a game with this rule. Because the players feeling like crap isn't what actually happens. What actually happens is laughter erupts at the table over the bad luck. Char1 Is down hardened at first "ok you guys got me." ... "wow wow wow, we could still roll 1's". Second player 10 "ah ha." Third player Nat 1. Whole table erupts in laughter. "NAT 1 BABY LETS GO!" "I can't believe we both rolled nat 1's." This is what legitimately happens at the table and they tell stories about it with their other DnD friends.
I run a Fantasy Flight Games Star Wars game. The dice have a triumph side and a Despair side. Now Triumph does not mean auto success nor does Despair mean auto fail on a check, but Triumph guarantees something good happens with the check, and Despairs guarantees something bad happens with the check. The despairs are as much fun as the triumphs. Sometimes because they are dreaded, sometimes because they are funny. Always because they add drama to the roll.
I think the difference in opinion largely comes from those who have played different systems and those who haven't. Having played many different TTRPG systems my biggest bugbear with DnD is the binary nature of success failure. I houserule sliding DC scales at my table to allow for everything from abject failure, through you almost did it, to you succeeded but, to well done its a straight success and wow that was amazing you did something really cool. That is driven from games like 7th sea and it feeds into my "getting the players to roll dice alot" because the dice result shapes the story and what happens.
Stating "you reach a door, it's locked, the rogue unlocks it with no issues" is very different to getting the player to roll a D20 to see how long it takes, is it heard, are signs left behind. Yes the party are def getting through that door but there are loads of things that dice roll can influence in the game other then that simple "yes/no" choice". Things that I wan't to be random and rolled for by players instead of me choosing or rolling for. I think of it as a little random encounter table every time I ask for an ability check I know can auto succeed or fail.
The non-binary part should be having skill checks more difficult than DC 10. If your rogue has +10 to the roll and the DM is still having him make DC 10 checks then that's a failure on the DMs part imo. If you need a gradient for success it's still there. If he only barely beats the check he manages to do whatever easy acrobatics feat you're requiring him to do (because DC 10 is explicitly an easy feat) but does it sloppily. If you're expecting him to be able to reasonably fail it you should give a harder check than 10. Simple as that.
It depends on the DM. I come from playing many many other TTRPG systems and hate the Binary nature of success failure that the D20 system gives, so I get round that in 2 ways by getting my players to roll, not every single time, but a lot if it is an auto succeed auto fail task. They understand that in that instance they are effectivley helping shape the story with a mini random encounter roll. Is someone/something alerted, either during or after, does something go wrong.
And the other way I do it is by not setting a single DC, instead there is a sliding scale. So a DC might be set at 17, well 15 and 16 are also a type of success, 17 and 18 are a normal success and 19+ is a great success they get a little bonus either in description or actually mechanically.
An example from a recent battle Player wanted to do that thing you see in films where you cut the rope to a chandelier and ride the rope up to the upper level to attack the crossbowman causing issues in the fight. Now DnD normal rules would have that take an action probably meaning when he got up there he would not be able to attack. I had him roll an Acrobatics check, he rolled a 18 for a total of 22. So I had it take a bonus action instead of an action and allowed him to make his attacks on the enemy.
Now the actual set of DC I had se in my head was as follows. Because it was a cool moment and I wanted him to at least get up there via it then the chance of it failing to work was tiny.
Nat 1 (5) he gets it all wrong lets go of the rope hits the balcony and falls to the floor (some bludgeoning damage) roll of 6-9 he gets up there but is the wrong side of the bannister, holding onto the rope, next turn he will have to get onto the balcony and the enemy gets advantage now to hit him. Loses action, bonus action and movement anything lower then a 17 but higher then a 10 (roll of 6-12) he gets up there but loses action, bonus action and movement 17/18 (13/14) he gets up there but it is clunky and awkward so he loses his action and bonus action, still has movement 19/20/21 (15-17) he gets up there costing him an action, still has bonus action (basic success) 22/23 (18/19) it just cost him his bonus action 24 (nat 20) it cost his bonus action and the surprise and fluidity of the action meant he landed and got advantage on his first attack on the crossbowman
Now you have taken a simple pass fail roll and turned it into a cinematic moment where you and the player have no idea whats about to happen. Rolling a 1 doesn't impact as much because you describe the moment to the payers and they are invested and love it. It isn't a simple oh you failed.
Right, in STA, gradation is built in. You get a range where you really screw up, a range where you fail but other than the implications of failure, there are no further consequences, a range where you succeed but only get the implications of success and then a range where you get a resound success and you get extra goodies.
It's easier to play than it sounds, but 5e has shied away from official complexity like that, but I have yet to play with a DM that doesn't provide some kind gradation rather than the official black-and-white nature of RAW. At the very least, a nat1 is usually a comical fail and a nat20 is a resounding success. Such gradation is something that I think should be an optional rule, at least.
Rolls on things that you auto fail or auto succeed in shouldn't necessarily be rolled at all - rolls slow down the game and should be seen as ingredients in cooking - too many and it can ruin the game. Autofails and autosucceeds are an obvious place to look at cutting back on to speed things up. On the other hand, they can provide narrative flavour, they can help change the direction of an adventure. They can also foster a sense of agency and depth - "Can I try and seduce the king?" "No, he's repulsed by people who are literally horny", "Oh, ok" doesn't. Rolling for it and allowing a high score to open up unexpected avenues. Okay, you don't end up in bed with the king, but maybe you charm him enough to start casting aside his bigotry, maybe instead of having you immediately executed for seducing his daughter, he has you imprisoned for life - giving you a better chance of escape.
When you view it like that, autofails and autosuccesses don't exist. You get "worst/best possible outcomes" instead. Which is why I'm not keen on this change in language in the rules. They shape a player's expectations that a nat20 means that they've succeeded, and to them, that means that the king invites them to his chambers.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
The non-binary part should be having skill checks more difficult than DC 10. If your rogue has +10 to the roll and the DM is still having him make DC 10 checks then that's a failure on the DMs part imo. If you need a gradient for success it's still there. If he only barely beats the check he manages to do whatever easy acrobatics feat you're requiring him to do (because DC 10 is explicitly an easy feat) but does it sloppily. If you're expecting him to be able to reasonably fail it you should give a harder check than 10. Simple as that.
It depends on the DM. I come from playing many many other TTRPG systems and hate the Binary nature of success failure that the D20 system gives, so I get round that in 2 ways by getting my players to roll, not every single time, but a lot if it is an auto succeed auto fail task. They understand that in that instance they are effectivley helping shape the story with a mini random encounter roll. Is someone/something alerted, either during or after, does something go wrong.
And the other way I do it is by not setting a single DC, instead there is a sliding scale. So a DC might be set at 17, well 15 and 16 are also a type of success, 17 and 18 are a normal success and 19+ is a great success they get a little bonus either in description or actually mechanically.
An example from a recent battle Player wanted to do that thing you see in films where you cut the rope to a chandelier and ride the rope up to the upper level to attack the crossbowman causing issues in the fight. Now DnD normal rules would have that take an action probably meaning when he got up there he would not be able to attack. I had him roll an Acrobatics check, he rolled a 18 for a total of 22. So I had it take a bonus action instead of an action and allowed him to make his attacks on the enemy.
Now the actual set of DC I had se in my head was as follows. Because it was a cool moment and I wanted him to at least get up there via it then the chance of it failing to work was tiny.
Nat 1 (5) he gets it all wrong lets go of the rope hits the balcony and falls to the floor (some bludgeoning damage) roll of 6-9 he gets up there but is the wrong side of the bannister, holding onto the rope, next turn he will have to get onto the balcony and the enemy gets advantage now to hit him. Loses action, bonus action and movement anything lower then a 17 but higher then a 10 (roll of 6-12) he gets up there but loses action, bonus action and movement 17/18 (13/14) he gets up there but it is clunky and awkward so he loses his action and bonus action, still has movement 19/20/21 (15-17) he gets up there costing him an action, still has bonus action (basic success) 22/23 (18/19) it just cost him his bonus action 24 (nat 20) it cost his bonus action and the surprise and fluidity of the action meant he landed and got advantage on his first attack on the crossbowman
Now you have taken a simple pass fail roll and turned it into a cinematic moment where you and the player have no idea whats about to happen. Rolling a 1 doesn't impact as much because you describe the moment to the payers and they are invested and love it. It isn't a simple oh you failed.
That is how I run my tables, and players love it.
I've also played a ton of other TTRPGs, and the binary success/failure system of DnD is also definitely a mark against the system in my book too. And if you're having the player, whose character has a high enough modifier to always succeed, roll anyways to check for things other than to determine success or failure I'm perfectly fine with that. Hell, I'd go as far as to say I prefer it that way. That said, my argument here is solely focused on the actual success/failure condition of the skill checks being made. For example, if a rogue with a +10 bonus to lockpicking rolls a nat 1 on a DC10 skill check I'm fine with him breaking his lock picks in the process of popping the lock as long as he does manage to pop the lock he was picking.
The non-binary part should be having skill checks more difficult than DC 10. If your rogue has +10 to the roll and the DM is still having him make DC 10 checks then that's a failure on the DMs part imo. If you need a gradient for success it's still there. If he only barely beats the check he manages to do whatever easy acrobatics feat you're requiring him to do (because DC 10 is explicitly an easy feat) but does it sloppily. If you're expecting him to be able to reasonably fail it you should give a harder check than 10. Simple as that.
It depends on the DM. I come from playing many many other TTRPG systems and hate the Binary nature of success failure that the D20 system gives, so I get round that in 2 ways by getting my players to roll, not every single time, but a lot if it is an auto succeed auto fail task. They understand that in that instance they are effectivley helping shape the story with a mini random encounter roll. Is someone/something alerted, either during or after, does something go wrong.
And the other way I do it is by not setting a single DC, instead there is a sliding scale. So a DC might be set at 17, well 15 and 16 are also a type of success, 17 and 18 are a normal success and 19+ is a great success they get a little bonus either in description or actually mechanically.
An example from a recent battle Player wanted to do that thing you see in films where you cut the rope to a chandelier and ride the rope up to the upper level to attack the crossbowman causing issues in the fight. Now DnD normal rules would have that take an action probably meaning when he got up there he would not be able to attack. I had him roll an Acrobatics check, he rolled a 18 for a total of 22. So I had it take a bonus action instead of an action and allowed him to make his attacks on the enemy.
Now the actual set of DC I had se in my head was as follows. Because it was a cool moment and I wanted him to at least get up there via it then the chance of it failing to work was tiny.
Nat 1 (5) he gets it all wrong lets go of the rope hits the balcony and falls to the floor (some bludgeoning damage) roll of 6-9 he gets up there but is the wrong side of the bannister, holding onto the rope, next turn he will have to get onto the balcony and the enemy gets advantage now to hit him. Loses action, bonus action and movement anything lower then a 17 but higher then a 10 (roll of 6-12) he gets up there but loses action, bonus action and movement 17/18 (13/14) he gets up there but it is clunky and awkward so he loses his action and bonus action, still has movement 19/20/21 (15-17) he gets up there costing him an action, still has bonus action (basic success) 22/23 (18/19) it just cost him his bonus action 24 (nat 20) it cost his bonus action and the surprise and fluidity of the action meant he landed and got advantage on his first attack on the crossbowman
Now you have taken a simple pass fail roll and turned it into a cinematic moment where you and the player have no idea whats about to happen. Rolling a 1 doesn't impact as much because you describe the moment to the payers and they are invested and love it. It isn't a simple oh you failed.
That is how I run my tables, and players love it.
I've also played a ton of other TTRPGs, and the binary success/failure system of DnD is also definitely a mark against the system in my book too. And if you're having the player, whose character has a high enough modifier to always succeed, roll anyways to check for things other than to determine success or failure I'm perfectly fine with that. Hell, I'd go as far as to say I prefer it that way. That said, my argument here is solely focused on the actual success/failure condition of the skill checks being made. For example, if a rogue with a +10 bonus to lockpicking rolls a nat 1 on a DC10 skill check I'm fine with him breaking his lock picks in the process of popping the lock as long as he does manage to pop the lock he was picking.
There are some instances of additional effects if you fail by 5 or more. For example, ghost's horrifying visage can cause someone to age by 1d4 *10 years if they fail the save by 5 or more. So some expansion on that sort of mechanic could be looked into. Might be interesting considering how enemies no longer crit and instead rely on abilities that recharge based on a d6 roll to do their bursts of damage.
Let's look on some things that D&D does not do well in on checks. That is tool kits. Lets take making a pair of boots. Simple repair job? Don't even roll. Boots are repaired. Want to make a pair of boots to sell at a profit? 10 difficulty 1 - fail something went wrong. Couldn't give them a way 2-9? They could pass as boots. They are poor quality and you could sell them at a discount. They would fall apart and not last a year 10 - Yep you made a standard pair of boots 11-19 - You succeed and they are better quality than expected 20 - Exceptional quality. You could sell these at twice the price. They are going to last a while
Take this example on some knowledge checks like history or Arcana Something that is common knowledge doesn't even need a roll. Like the current king. Auto success. 1 - fail they can't remember anything thing about the piece of knowledge 2-9 the may get it wrong. 10 - They remember the fact 11-19 they remember a bit more of the lore 20 - They know it and get a bit more knowledge.
I could give more examples of abilities.
I also have no problem rolling on a +10 on a roll. I am going to succeed so many times. Our DM also adds flourish to it. The higher you roll than the difficulty you can add some flavor to it.
I just want to know how often are people rolling 1's. It happens so rarely for us that when we do it hurts. It is supposed to hurt. I roll more 20's than I do 1's.
Let's look on some things that D&D does not do well in on checks. That is tool kits. Lets take making a pair of boots. Simple repair job? Don't even roll. Boots are repaired. Want to make a pair of boots to sell at a profit? 10 difficulty 1 - fail something went wrong. Couldn't give them a way 2-9? They could pass as boots. They are poor quality and you could sell them at a discount. They would fall apart and not last a year 10 - Yep you made a standard pair of boots 11-19 - You succeed and they are better quality than expected 20 - Exceptional quality. You could sell these at twice the price. They are going to last a while
Take this example on some knowledge checks like history or Arcana Something that is common knowledge doesn't even need a roll. Like the current king. Auto success. 1 - fail they can't remember anything thing about the piece of knowledge 2-9 the may get it wrong. 10 - They remember the fact 11-19 they remember a bit more of the lore 20 - They know it and get a bit more knowledge.
I could give more examples of abilities.
I also have no problem rolling on a +10 on a roll. I am going to succeed so many times. Our DM also adds flourish to it. The higher you roll than the difficulty you can add some flavor to it.
I just want to know how often are people rolling 1's. It happens so rarely for us that when we do it hurts. It is supposed to hurt. I roll more 20's than I do 1's.
Memories can be selective, but basic math tells us 1/20 rolls on average will be a 1. Unless the die you use is severely flawed, you should be rolling a 1 once every 20 rolls.
One thing the DM of the current adventure I am in does is only have me roll when certain pieces of information require a higher roll than what I could achieve if I rolled a Nat 1. I often automatically know about Arcana related things because my Arcana is a +17 so at minimum I can roll an 18, so unless the information needs a higher DC, I am often just given the information, letting my character be played as incredible knowledgable, which makes sense as in their backstory they were raised in Candlekeep and spent many nights browsing its contents. Then, even if I have to roll, I can often auto succeed by using Flash of Genius thus boosting my minimum roll to 23. It has become kind of a joke that if we need to know something that could have been learned from books, everyone just looks at my Artificer, expecting her to randomly have that knowledge, which she does most of the time. Really helps establish the character I was going for and will probably make her one of my most memorable characters.
Ok aside from the rule and DC of actions - this takes away the spotlight from people - The muscle-bound no intel orc is good at breaking down doors and smashing things but the weak but wise wizard can be overshadowed by the orc on a arcane check if he rolls a nat 20 based on the raw. So you can go back and forth saying you can only role if you have XYZ but there will be times where one role should be addressed by one type of character and then everyone else can do it even better if they roll a nat 20. this issue only applies to skill checks. Tell me the paladin who gets a nat 20 on stealth check in plate armor can hide better than the expert rogue who rolled a 19 and has over +11 to stealth.
Ok aside from the rule and DC of actions - this takes away the spotlight from people - The muscle-bound no intel orc is good at breaking down doors and smashing things but the weak but wise wizard can be overshadowed by the orc on a arcane check if he rolls a nat 20 based on the raw. So you can go back and forth saying you can only role if you have XYZ but there will be times where one role should be addressed by one type of character and then everyone else can do it even better if they roll a nat 20. this issue only applies to skill checks. Tell me the paladin who gets a nat 20 on stealth check in plate armor can hide better than the expert rogue who rolled a 19 and has over +11 to stealth.
And that is just a lucky moment. This is basically saying the wizard is much more likely to know this. But in the rare instance in which the dumb barbarian was ASKED to roll an arcane check AND rolled a Nat 20 he gets to know something. Why not? everyone in real life has different experiences and can surprise you with knowing like 1 random fact about something that even the expert would have had to look up. I don't see why that is weird for a DnD character to have happen. Or sometimes the big guy hits it and it "lossened it up" for the little guy. Sometimes you just get lucky on something, or unlucky. That is what a nat 1 and a nat 20 are.
This rule really most strongly falls apart when there's unknown information involved.
Insight checks are often made opposed to a Deception check the DM makes in secret, even if they person being checked is telling the truth, so that the player doing the insight check doesn't learn something out-of-character that they didn't learn in character (if the DM only makes a Deception check when it's actually a lie, then the players know it's a lie even if the lying NPC succeeds in beating the Insight check with their Deception check). This way, the player doing the Insight check only learns whether their character thinks what the NPC said is true, but without magic they don't know whether it's actually true or whether the other person is just a really good liar.
But with this rule, if the player making the insight check gets a 20, they know for a fact that if they're told something is true, it's true.
Perception checks to detect traps are often made regardless of whether there are any traps and whether the character has a chance to detect them. If you just tell them 'there are no traps' when they ask to look for traps without making them roll, then they'll know for a fact that there are traps if you do make them roll. And if you don't let them roll because they have no chance to detect the trap then they will know there is a trap and that they can't detect where it is. It's really hard not to meta-game with that in the back of your head.
But with this rule, if the player rolling Perception to check for traps rolls a 20 and you say "You don't see any traps." they know for a fact that there are no traps.
And if you then still spring a trap on them (say, a trapdoor that causes them all to fall into a part of the dungeon that no one's ever been to and where they will find a magical artefact that will kick off the main plot), they will get upset at you for not telling them it was there even though they rolled a 20. Or if you do tell them it's there they'll avoid it and never kick off the main plot (unless you railroad them. Fun!)
A Stealth check is usually rolled against the passive perception of the creatures that one is trying to sneak past (or up on). The spell Pass Without Trace is therefore pretty powerful, as the +10 it gives to Stealth checks makes sneaking into an automatic success against the passive perceptions of most creatures (at least for any character with a positive Dex score).
But with this rule, even a level 10 Rogue with Expertise in Stealth and 20 Dex (for a total of +13 on Stealth) can still fail to sneak past a pack of Kobolds (passive perception: 8 !) after having Pass Without Trace.
Honestly though, the most important reason why this rule is bad is the reason why the Take 20 rule exists: If there's no time pressure and no price for failure, players will keep rolling until they succeed. And with 20 being an automatic success, the will always succeed (eventually)...
This rule is just going to lead to players constantly demanding to be allowed to reroll on any task that they didn't succeed at that isn't time sensitive.
It's going to lead to dejected DMs either allowing the party to succeed at absolutely everything that would require a roll without actually asking for a roll, because they'll just reroll until they get an automatic success or overstressed Players having to deal with their DM constantly putting time pressure on absolutely everything in order to prevent them from rerolling on everything until they automatically succeed.
'Automatic failure on 1, automatic success on 20' works as a house rule, because house rules are optional and can be taken away if they're being abused. But it doesn't work as a core rule, because then you have to deal with it in instances where players will abuse it. Like, say, when running an Adventurers League game with a new player who hasn't yet learned to treat D&D as a collaborative storytelling game, instead of treating it like an analogue video game they want to win.
Ok aside from the rule and DC of actions - this takes away the spotlight from people - The muscle-bound no intel orc is good at breaking down doors and smashing things but the weak but wise wizard can be overshadowed by the orc on a arcane check if he rolls a nat 20 based on the raw. So you can go back and forth saying you can only role if you have XYZ but there will be times where one role should be addressed by one type of character and then everyone else can do it even better if they roll a nat 20. this issue only applies to skill checks. Tell me the paladin who gets a nat 20 on stealth check in plate armor can hide better than the expert rogue who rolled a 19 and has over +11 to stealth.
And that is just a lucky moment. This is basically saying the wizard is much more likely to know this. But in the rare instance in which the dumb barbarian was ASKED to roll an arcane check AND rolled a Nat 20 he gets to know something. Why not? everyone in real life has different experiences and can surprise you with knowing like 1 random fact about something that even the expert would have had to look up. I don't see why that is weird for a DnD character to have happen. Or sometimes the big guy hits it and it "lossened it up" for the little guy. Sometimes you just get lucky on something, or unlucky. That is what a nat 1 and a nat 20 are.
So at my table if the Barbarian asks the question, then it is the Barbarian that rolls the dice, and that can be the player asking me a question in passing. "Would we know what the history of this town is, do we know what this symbol on the ground means". Maybe the Barbarian rolls a nat 20 to which the information I will give them is "You look at the symbol, and, something clicks, a memory from several years ago (pre game), a similar symbol to that triggering a very painful effect on a good friend of your's you didn't see it directly but, they drew it out as a warning".
The players never gameify rolls, there is no asking, who has the best history, the best investigation or the best stealth. Now, I may then allow the wizard with proficiency to roll as well, or, maybe they know, but, if they have not specifically looked at and studied that symbol then their character won't instinctively know. Sometimes the Barbarian is the first into the room and so is the one to roll perception/investigation, they see the symbol and then just doesn't point it out to anyone else and they move through the room onwards. In that situation (taken from a real game), the Barbarian simply told the player, be careful pain is ahead, in the next room when he finally mentioned the symbol the wizard went back and studied it and realised it was part of an intricate magical trap that ran through the dungeon.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
As I have said before, it isn't always so binary with skills. With Saves and Attacks rolls, it is very much "Hit or Miss", but with Skills, sometimes it about how well you succeed or bad you failed. If you like the idea that there is a nothing but a yes or no answer to Skill checks, that is fine. I and those I play the game with just don't agree. Everyone should fill out the survey based on their own desires for the game after all, that is what the playtest and survey are for.
She/Her Player and Dungeon Master
Yeah, in general, I don't agree with the "if there's no way for them to succeed, don't have them roll" school of thought. While we can probably all agree on not rolling for utterly ridiculous things ("I attempt to jump to the moon!"), most attempts at skill or ability checks aren't quite that farfetched. And it can be a piece of worldbuilding, or a clue, if the player rolls an adjusted 23 (or 27) and fails. It tells them something, rather than just being a yes/no/you cannot succeed - especially if all previous similar checks were significantly less (or more) difficult.
In another RPG I play, the rule is that you only rule of the result is in question and meaningful. If you're going to get the same result regardless of how they roll, then you don't roll - otherwise, you do roll. Note, that never mentioned anything about success. The roll just has to be meaningful - in other words, you are looking to resolve a situation and how they roll will effect the end result.
If rolling a 20 or a 1 ends up with the same result, then you don't roll. If they end up with different results, even if it's just different modes of failure - say, the difference between no additional negative consequences and the characters getting their backsides whooped - then roll, assuming the likelihood of both options is high enough.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
No but to say that the best of the best never fails does make it binary. It just will always be success.
My Rogue gets a +10 on Acrobatics skill checks. He is going to succeed most skill checks. A 20 means he does it perfectly. A 1 means he falls flat on his face. Everything in between is that non-binary part you are talking about.
The non-binary part should be having skill checks more difficult than DC 10. If your rogue has +10 to the roll and the DM is still having him make DC 10 checks then that's a failure on the DMs part imo. If you need a gradient for success it's still there. If he only barely beats the check he manages to do whatever easy acrobatics feat you're requiring him to do (because DC 10 is explicitly an easy feat) but does it sloppily. If you're expecting him to be able to reasonably fail it you should give a harder check than 10. Simple as that.
I think the way I'd change how this works with skill checks would be to base it on proficiency. Skill Check without proficiency? The Nat 1 Rule is in play; you might be naturally strong, with a +5 to athletics, but you haven't studied lifting techniques or proper breath control that would help you lift that boulder, so there's a chance you'll goof it. Skill Check with proficiency? Nat 20 Rule is a go; you've studied how to step silently and blend in with the environment, so you at least safeguard your attempt with the basics, even if you've only got a +1.
In roughly a week we will be able to fill out the survey and give our feedback. I know what mine will be. It will be interesting to see what comes out the other side of all this.
She/Her Player and Dungeon Master
Just because someone can succeed at some rolls on a nat 1 doesn't mean they will succeed at all rolls on a nat 1. My group just went through a mindflayer colony at 16th level and my Int Save was high enough to autosave against the mindblast. Still was one of the most challenging dungeon crawls I have ever went through.
It is fine for players to autosucceed at tasks. Hell, your example with a lock, a rogue with expertise is supposed to do that. Reliable Talent replaces any roll of 9 or lower with a 10 if they are proficient, this includes nat 1's so a rogue with reliable talent will never roll a nat 1 if they are proficient. At levels 13+, a rogue can easily have a minimum roll of 25 with thieves tools; add on gloves of thievery and it becomes a minimum roll of 30 while never being able to roll a nat 1 and thus never failing at this task.
However, they can fail at other tasks. An enemy hits the rogue with a strength save? Probably going to fail with that 8 str and no proficiency.
Just because your table likes autofail on nat 1's doesn't mean others do. Definitely also does not mean they never played with auto fail on Nat 1's. My group used to and we stopped when we learned it was not RAW nor RAI because it just felt miserable to fail when your modifier exceeded the DC. We didn't laugh about it, we straight up did not find it fun.
Fun fact: Unless you build a character that can succeed on a nat 1, by RAW, the auto fail rule does nothing to hinder you as you would have failed on a Nat 1 anyway. Conversely, the auto success portion of a nat 20 by RAW is meaningless if you had the modifiers to succeed on a nat 1.
I play in 3 different groups and they have all kind of had the same response to nat 1's, but that is probably just the type of people I attract. It is a different strokes for different folks kind of thing. As far as I am concerned it could be an optional rule and it would be fine. People play this way regardless.
I think the difference in opinion largely comes from those who have played different systems and those who haven't. Having played many different TTRPG systems my biggest bugbear with DnD is the binary nature of success failure. I houserule sliding DC scales at my table to allow for everything from abject failure, through you almost did it, to you succeeded but, to well done its a straight success and wow that was amazing you did something really cool. That is driven from games like 7th sea and it feeds into my "getting the players to roll dice alot" because the dice result shapes the story and what happens.
Stating "you reach a door, it's locked, the rogue unlocks it with no issues" is very different to getting the player to roll a D20 to see how long it takes, is it heard, are signs left behind. Yes the party are def getting through that door but there are loads of things that dice roll can influence in the game other then that simple "yes/no" choice". Things that I wan't to be random and rolled for by players instead of me choosing or rolling for. I think of it as a little random encounter table every time I ask for an ability check I know can auto succeed or fail.
It depends on the DM. I come from playing many many other TTRPG systems and hate the Binary nature of success failure that the D20 system gives, so I get round that in 2 ways by getting my players to roll, not every single time, but a lot if it is an auto succeed auto fail task. They understand that in that instance they are effectivley helping shape the story with a mini random encounter roll. Is someone/something alerted, either during or after, does something go wrong.
And the other way I do it is by not setting a single DC, instead there is a sliding scale. So a DC might be set at 17, well 15 and 16 are also a type of success, 17 and 18 are a normal success and 19+ is a great success they get a little bonus either in description or actually mechanically.
An example from a recent battle
Player wanted to do that thing you see in films where you cut the rope to a chandelier and ride the rope up to the upper level to attack the crossbowman causing issues in the fight. Now DnD normal rules would have that take an action probably meaning when he got up there he would not be able to attack. I had him roll an Acrobatics check, he rolled a 18 for a total of 22. So I had it take a bonus action instead of an action and allowed him to make his attacks on the enemy.
Now the actual set of DC I had se in my head was as follows. Because it was a cool moment and I wanted him to at least get up there via it then the chance of it failing to work was tiny.
Nat 1 (5) he gets it all wrong lets go of the rope hits the balcony and falls to the floor (some bludgeoning damage)
roll of 6-9 he gets up there but is the wrong side of the bannister, holding onto the rope, next turn he will have to get onto the balcony and the enemy gets advantage now to hit him. Loses action, bonus action and movement
anything lower then a 17 but higher then a 10 (roll of 6-12) he gets up there but loses action, bonus action and movement
17/18 (13/14) he gets up there but it is clunky and awkward so he loses his action and bonus action, still has movement
19/20/21 (15-17) he gets up there costing him an action, still has bonus action (basic success)
22/23 (18/19) it just cost him his bonus action
24 (nat 20) it cost his bonus action and the surprise and fluidity of the action meant he landed and got advantage on his first attack on the crossbowman
Now you have taken a simple pass fail roll and turned it into a cinematic moment where you and the player have no idea whats about to happen. Rolling a 1 doesn't impact as much because you describe the moment to the payers and they are invested and love it. It isn't a simple oh you failed.
That is how I run my tables, and players love it.
Right, in STA, gradation is built in. You get a range where you really screw up, a range where you fail but other than the implications of failure, there are no further consequences, a range where you succeed but only get the implications of success and then a range where you get a resound success and you get extra goodies.
It's easier to play than it sounds, but 5e has shied away from official complexity like that, but I have yet to play with a DM that doesn't provide some kind gradation rather than the official black-and-white nature of RAW. At the very least, a nat1 is usually a comical fail and a nat20 is a resounding success. Such gradation is something that I think should be an optional rule, at least.
Rolls on things that you auto fail or auto succeed in shouldn't necessarily be rolled at all - rolls slow down the game and should be seen as ingredients in cooking - too many and it can ruin the game. Autofails and autosucceeds are an obvious place to look at cutting back on to speed things up. On the other hand, they can provide narrative flavour, they can help change the direction of an adventure. They can also foster a sense of agency and depth - "Can I try and seduce the king?" "No, he's repulsed by people who are literally horny", "Oh, ok" doesn't. Rolling for it and allowing a high score to open up unexpected avenues. Okay, you don't end up in bed with the king, but maybe you charm him enough to start casting aside his bigotry, maybe instead of having you immediately executed for seducing his daughter, he has you imprisoned for life - giving you a better chance of escape.
When you view it like that, autofails and autosuccesses don't exist. You get "worst/best possible outcomes" instead. Which is why I'm not keen on this change in language in the rules. They shape a player's expectations that a nat20 means that they've succeeded, and to them, that means that the king invites them to his chambers.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
I've also played a ton of other TTRPGs, and the binary success/failure system of DnD is also definitely a mark against the system in my book too. And if you're having the player, whose character has a high enough modifier to always succeed, roll anyways to check for things other than to determine success or failure I'm perfectly fine with that. Hell, I'd go as far as to say I prefer it that way. That said, my argument here is solely focused on the actual success/failure condition of the skill checks being made. For example, if a rogue with a +10 bonus to lockpicking rolls a nat 1 on a DC10 skill check I'm fine with him breaking his lock picks in the process of popping the lock as long as he does manage to pop the lock he was picking.
There are some instances of additional effects if you fail by 5 or more. For example, ghost's horrifying visage can cause someone to age by 1d4 *10 years if they fail the save by 5 or more. So some expansion on that sort of mechanic could be looked into. Might be interesting considering how enemies no longer crit and instead rely on abilities that recharge based on a d6 roll to do their bursts of damage.
Let's look on some things that D&D does not do well in on checks. That is tool kits.
Lets take making a pair of boots.
Simple repair job? Don't even roll. Boots are repaired.
Want to make a pair of boots to sell at a profit? 10 difficulty
1 - fail something went wrong. Couldn't give them a way
2-9? They could pass as boots. They are poor quality and you could sell them at a discount. They would fall apart and not last a year
10 - Yep you made a standard pair of boots
11-19 - You succeed and they are better quality than expected
20 - Exceptional quality. You could sell these at twice the price. They are going to last a while
Take this example on some knowledge checks like history or Arcana
Something that is common knowledge doesn't even need a roll. Like the current king. Auto success.
1 - fail they can't remember anything thing about the piece of knowledge
2-9 the may get it wrong.
10 - They remember the fact
11-19 they remember a bit more of the lore
20 - They know it and get a bit more knowledge.
I could give more examples of abilities.
I also have no problem rolling on a +10 on a roll. I am going to succeed so many times. Our DM also adds flourish to it. The higher you roll than the difficulty you can add some flavor to it.
I just want to know how often are people rolling 1's. It happens so rarely for us that when we do it hurts. It is supposed to hurt. I roll more 20's than I do 1's.
Memories can be selective, but basic math tells us 1/20 rolls on average will be a 1. Unless the die you use is severely flawed, you should be rolling a 1 once every 20 rolls.
One thing the DM of the current adventure I am in does is only have me roll when certain pieces of information require a higher roll than what I could achieve if I rolled a Nat 1. I often automatically know about Arcana related things because my Arcana is a +17 so at minimum I can roll an 18, so unless the information needs a higher DC, I am often just given the information, letting my character be played as incredible knowledgable, which makes sense as in their backstory they were raised in Candlekeep and spent many nights browsing its contents. Then, even if I have to roll, I can often auto succeed by using Flash of Genius thus boosting my minimum roll to 23. It has become kind of a joke that if we need to know something that could have been learned from books, everyone just looks at my Artificer, expecting her to randomly have that knowledge, which she does most of the time. Really helps establish the character I was going for and will probably make her one of my most memorable characters.
Ok aside from the rule and DC of actions - this takes away the spotlight from people - The muscle-bound no intel orc is good at breaking down doors and smashing things but the weak but wise wizard can be overshadowed by the orc on a arcane check if he rolls a nat 20 based on the raw. So you can go back and forth saying you can only role if you have XYZ but there will be times where one role should be addressed by one type of character and then everyone else can do it even better if they roll a nat 20. this issue only applies to skill checks. Tell me the paladin who gets a nat 20 on stealth check in plate armor can hide better than the expert rogue who rolled a 19 and has over +11 to stealth.
And that is just a lucky moment. This is basically saying the wizard is much more likely to know this. But in the rare instance in which the dumb barbarian was ASKED to roll an arcane check AND rolled a Nat 20 he gets to know something. Why not? everyone in real life has different experiences and can surprise you with knowing like 1 random fact about something that even the expert would have had to look up. I don't see why that is weird for a DnD character to have happen. Or sometimes the big guy hits it and it "lossened it up" for the little guy. Sometimes you just get lucky on something, or unlucky. That is what a nat 1 and a nat 20 are.
This rule really most strongly falls apart when there's unknown information involved.
Insight checks are often made opposed to a Deception check the DM makes in secret, even if they person being checked is telling the truth, so that the player doing the insight check doesn't learn something out-of-character that they didn't learn in character (if the DM only makes a Deception check when it's actually a lie, then the players know it's a lie even if the lying NPC succeeds in beating the Insight check with their Deception check). This way, the player doing the Insight check only learns whether their character thinks what the NPC said is true, but without magic they don't know whether it's actually true or whether the other person is just a really good liar.
But with this rule, if the player making the insight check gets a 20, they know for a fact that if they're told something is true, it's true.
Perception checks to detect traps are often made regardless of whether there are any traps and whether the character has a chance to detect them. If you just tell them 'there are no traps' when they ask to look for traps without making them roll, then they'll know for a fact that there are traps if you do make them roll. And if you don't let them roll because they have no chance to detect the trap then they will know there is a trap and that they can't detect where it is. It's really hard not to meta-game with that in the back of your head.
But with this rule, if the player rolling Perception to check for traps rolls a 20 and you say "You don't see any traps." they know for a fact that there are no traps.
And if you then still spring a trap on them (say, a trapdoor that causes them all to fall into a part of the dungeon that no one's ever been to and where they will find a magical artefact that will kick off the main plot), they will get upset at you for not telling them it was there even though they rolled a 20. Or if you do tell them it's there they'll avoid it and never kick off the main plot (unless you railroad them. Fun!)
A Stealth check is usually rolled against the passive perception of the creatures that one is trying to sneak past (or up on). The spell Pass Without Trace is therefore pretty powerful, as the +10 it gives to Stealth checks makes sneaking into an automatic success against the passive perceptions of most creatures (at least for any character with a positive Dex score).
But with this rule, even a level 10 Rogue with Expertise in Stealth and 20 Dex (for a total of +13 on Stealth) can still fail to sneak past a pack of Kobolds (passive perception: 8 !) after having Pass Without Trace.
Honestly though, the most important reason why this rule is bad is the reason why the Take 20 rule exists: If there's no time pressure and no price for failure, players will keep rolling until they succeed. And with 20 being an automatic success, the will always succeed (eventually)...
This rule is just going to lead to players constantly demanding to be allowed to reroll on any task that they didn't succeed at that isn't time sensitive.
It's going to lead to dejected DMs either allowing the party to succeed at absolutely everything that would require a roll without actually asking for a roll, because they'll just reroll until they get an automatic success or overstressed Players having to deal with their DM constantly putting time pressure on absolutely everything in order to prevent them from rerolling on everything until they automatically succeed.
'Automatic failure on 1, automatic success on 20' works as a house rule, because house rules are optional and can be taken away if they're being abused. But it doesn't work as a core rule, because then you have to deal with it in instances where players will abuse it. Like, say, when running an Adventurers League game with a new player who hasn't yet learned to treat D&D as a collaborative storytelling game, instead of treating it like an analogue video game they want to win.
So at my table if the Barbarian asks the question, then it is the Barbarian that rolls the dice, and that can be the player asking me a question in passing. "Would we know what the history of this town is, do we know what this symbol on the ground means". Maybe the Barbarian rolls a nat 20 to which the information I will give them is "You look at the symbol, and, something clicks, a memory from several years ago (pre game), a similar symbol to that triggering a very painful effect on a good friend of your's you didn't see it directly but, they drew it out as a warning".
The players never gameify rolls, there is no asking, who has the best history, the best investigation or the best stealth. Now, I may then allow the wizard with proficiency to roll as well, or, maybe they know, but, if they have not specifically looked at and studied that symbol then their character won't instinctively know. Sometimes the Barbarian is the first into the room and so is the one to roll perception/investigation, they see the symbol and then just doesn't point it out to anyone else and they move through the room onwards. In that situation (taken from a real game), the Barbarian simply told the player, be careful pain is ahead, in the next room when he finally mentioned the symbol the wizard went back and studied it and realised it was part of an intricate magical trap that ran through the dungeon.