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  1. - Top - End - #1
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    DrowGuy

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    Default One Roll to Know it All

    So this came up in my game again. The idea that a knowledge check should tell a character everything. Like a single rank in knowledge(something) represents an intensive four year study course.

    But, it just sucks all the fun out of the game. When you make a knowledge roll, your just skipping over the fun discovery of the game. Worse it makes D&D just a roll playing game, not a role playing game. It's a question of play styles.

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    The basic idea of the knowledge check is for the causal gamer. The one who has far too busy a life to care very much about a game. (Yet oddly, they still find the time to game and still want to game, but such things are beyond this thread). The kind of player that can't figure out, say, that ''the Red Wizards are a group of evil wizards'' after they see some npc's do cast some arcane spells and do evil things. Or maybe they just don't want to take the time or effort to do so.

    But as D&D is a role playing game, and it might impact a players fun if they get left out as they don't know something. So the knowledge roll was made and put into place so that the casual gamer can know all.


    So the question comes down to, why are so many players obsessed with sucking the fun out of the game and ruining it, just so they can ''know everything''? I just don't get it.

    Example:The group enters a cavern and sees:Starting in midair in the center of the cavern dark black oil-like liquid falls ten feet or so down into a pool of the same liquid. Though several gallons of the liquid fall each second, the pool oddly does not seem to change the amount that is in it. The air around all this liquid is noticeably colder then the rest of the cavern. A nice strange and mysterious thing for the players to find...

    The group with the causal player: Player:Oh I rolled a 30 on my know everything roll. DM:Oh, it's a physical manifestation of a portal to the plane of shadow, if you touch it it will zap you to the plane of shadow. Group:Oh, ok, we avoid that and look around for anything to kill or loot. So the nice encounter the DM had planed only takes like ten seconds, as everyone has 'fun' not doing anything

    The involved group game:Slowly, the entire group approaches the strange pool of liquid, careful not to get close. Player 1:Adom carefully looks to see if any of the liquid is splashing out of the pool. DM:No, all the liquid stays within the pool area. Player 2:Reno takes out a copper coin and tosses it into the pool. DM:As soon as the coin touches the liquid if fades from sight, but you can't tell if it just sank or was teleported away. Player 3:Woah, ok, wait, I'll try to touch it with my ten foot pole. Player 4:Wait, don't hold onto the pole, I'll use mage hand to hold it. So the whole group is now involved in figuring out this encounter. It's no longer just ''one player causally rolling a dice''

    Now I'm not saying it's wrong if a player just wants to ''roll to know it all'' and skip past all the fun discovery of a role playing game. My question is more: Why would you want too?
    Last edited by Vorr; 2013-01-30 at 07:45 PM.

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    RangerGuy

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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    You may as well ask why bother having Knowledge skills at all, if it's incumbent on the players to dope things out through trial and error. Players put points into those skills to represent their characters' expertise, and they should get something worthwhile for the investment—especially if they use the information they get to drive how they roleplay the situation, rather than use it to make the best metagame decision.

    It's up to the GM to moderate what information the players receive. The fault in your first example does not lie with the player who attempted to use a skill to get information relevant to the adventure; it's the fault of the GM who let that one roll give so much info that there was no tension or mystery.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    "Fun discovery" should be reserved for things that are discoveries. Knowledge checks are used to represent things that are already known. You don't need to "discover" that red dragons are immune to fire, for instance.

    A portal to another plane is not an encounter, and hating on Knowledge checks because they mean players don't have to rediscover everything they see is extremely counter-productive.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    I don't see why the DM should tell it to the player, even if he succeeded on a DC 30 Knowledge check. If it's something the DM created for the game, it stands to reason it's something special, and the player has no information about it. Even with a Knowledge check.

    Or maybe the DM could just provide a useful, yet cryptic clue, to make things more interesting, not less interesting.

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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    In your example, I'd question why a character would know that is a door to the elemental plane of Shadow.

    Usually my rule of thumb (With any skill) is "Justify it to me" then based on their justification I determine if they can just "roll it away". Also allows for outside the obvious box use. And I personally cringe every time a player goes, "Okay, what knowledge skill do I need to roll to know about..." If you as a player can't figure out if Knowledge (The Planes) or Knowledge (Architecture) applies then how would your character know if he's looking at something extra-planar or just a feat of neat engineering? Try one or the other and give me a reason why you think that. Even if it's wrong it might still reveal stuff.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by Vorr View Post
    Example:The group enters a cavern and sees:Starting in midair in the center of the cavern dark black oil-like liquid falls ten feet or so down into a pool of the same liquid. Though several gallons of the liquid fall each second, the pool oddly does not seem to change the amount that is in it. The air around all this liquid is noticeably colder then the rest of the cavern. A nice strange and mysterious thing for the players to find...

    The group with the causal player: Player:Oh I rolled a 30 on my know everything roll. DM:Oh, it's a physical manifestation of a portal to the plane of shadow, if you touch it it will zap you to the plane of shadow. Group:Oh, ok, we avoid that and look around for anything to kill or loot. So the nice encounter the DM had planed only takes like ten seconds, as everyone has 'fun' not doing anything

    The involved group game:Slowly, the entire group approaches the strange pool of liquid, careful not to get close. Player 1:Adom carefully looks to see if any of the liquid is splashing out of the pool. DM:No, all the liquid stays within the pool area. Player 2:Reno takes out a copper coin and tosses it into the pool. DM:As soon as the coin touches the liquid if fades from sight, but you can't tell if it just sank or was teleported away. Player 3:Woah, ok, wait, I'll try to touch it with my ten foot pole. Player 4:Wait, don't hold onto the pole, I'll use mage hand to hold it. So the whole group is now involved in figuring out this encounter. It's no longer just ''one player causally rolling a dice''

    Now I'm not saying it's wrong if a player just wants to ''roll to know it all'' and skip past all the fun discovery of a role playing game. My question is more: Why would you want too?
    Why could it not be both? Just add 'think.'

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    Oh, you think it's a physical manifestation of a portal to the plane of shadow, if you touch it it will zap you to the plane of shadow.
    The word 'think' would be used to create suspicion, so that the "casual players" would experiment and do things similar to the "involved players."

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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by Vorr View Post
    So this came up in my game again. The idea that a knowledge check should tell a character everything. Like a single rank in knowledge(something) represents an intensive four year study course.

    But, it just sucks all the fun out of the game. When you make a knowledge roll, your just skipping over the fun discovery of the game. Worse it makes D&D just a roll playing game, not a role playing game. It's a question of play styles.

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    The basic idea of the knowledge check is for the causal gamer. The one who has far too busy a life to care very much about a game. (Yet oddly, they still find the time to game and still want to game, but such things are beyond this thread). The kind of player that can't figure out, say, that ''the Red Wizards are a group of evil wizards'' after they see some npc's do cast some arcane spells and do evil things. Or maybe they just don't want to take the time or effort to do so.

    But as D&D is a role playing game, and it might impact a players fun if they get left out as they don't know something. So the knowledge roll was made and put into place so that the casual gamer can know all.


    So the question comes down to, why are so many players obsessed with sucking the fun out of the game and ruining it, just so they can ''know everything''? I just don't get it.

    Example:The group enters a cavern and sees:Starting in midair in the center of the cavern dark black oil-like liquid falls ten feet or so down into a pool of the same liquid. Though several gallons of the liquid fall each second, the pool oddly does not seem to change the amount that is in it. The air around all this liquid is noticeably colder then the rest of the cavern. A nice strange and mysterious thing for the players to find...

    The group with the causal player: Player:Oh I rolled a 30 on my know everything roll. DM:Oh, it's a physical manifestation of a portal to the plane of shadow, if you touch it it will zap you to the plane of shadow. Group:Oh, ok, we avoid that and look around for anything to kill or loot. So the nice encounter the DM had planed only takes like ten seconds, as everyone has 'fun' not doing anything

    The involved group game:Slowly, the entire group approaches the strange pool of liquid, careful not to get close. Player 1:Adom carefully looks to see if any of the liquid is splashing out of the pool. DM:No, all the liquid stays within the pool area. Player 2:Reno takes out a copper coin and tosses it into the pool. DM:As soon as the coin touches the liquid if fades from sight, but you can't tell if it just sank or was teleported away. Player 3:Woah, ok, wait, I'll try to touch it with my ten foot pole. Player 4:Wait, don't hold onto the pole, I'll use mage hand to hold it. So the whole group is now involved in figuring out this encounter. It's no longer just ''one player causally rolling a dice''

    Now I'm not saying it's wrong if a player just wants to ''roll to know it all'' and skip past all the fun discovery of a role playing game. My question is more: Why would you want too?

    So those are both extreme examples. I know when I gm and I run an encounter similar to what you described If a player wants to roll a knowledge check... because lets be honest the groups sage character may have knowledge about this thing... Generally players could roll knowledge about the liquid, known effects that are similar. I see it as helping the players understand the world... ecology, mineralogy, genealogy, the effects of magic... To me it is a way the GM gets to explain the reasons why things are, even the in game rules of the cosmos.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    D&D 3.5 doesn't work without knowledge checks. There are lots of monsters that have abilities that will destroy a party that doesn't expect them, and that aren't immediately evident from their description.

    In a high lethality game like 2nd end and earlier, you can get rid of knowledge checks because if the mystery monster kills a character it's no big deal. In a more forgiving game the characters can take a few rounds to make mistakes and figure out the monster's abilities, and there is a sense of discovery. D&D 3.5 is neither of those games: combat is fast, characters are detailed and take effort to create, and "discovering a new monster" often means a character will die.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by ArcturusV View Post
    If you as a player can't figure out if Knowledge (The Planes) or Knowledge (Architecture) applies then how would your character know if he's looking at something extra-planar or just a feat of neat engineering?
    The same way a character with ranks in Knowledge (Electronic Devices) and Knowledge (Construction Materials) would know he's looking at the core part of a desktop computer and not a strangely colored large brick, even if the player has never seen so much as a light bulb or a building not made of wood.

    Identifying which knowledge skill is applicable is itself a use of knowledge, and as such should be granted by the skill.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    That is misrepresenting what I was saying quite a bit. If you look at the description of the example? That could be magic (Arcana), it could be extra-planar (The Planes), it could be the result of a cursing (Religion), or it could be a variation of a simple fountain with an unusual alchemical liquid (Architecture and Engineering). And it's NOT obvious which of those it is. Not at all.

    A more apt version of your example would be someone looking at an Astrolabe and trying to guess if it was a Navigational Instrument or a tool of Astronomy. Someone skilled in Astronomy might go "Oh, it's a tool for Astronomy!" and look at it that way. A skilled navigator might go "Oh, it's a tool for celestial navigation!" and look at it that way.

    They are both possibly correct. But if it was an enchanted object it might serve a purpose for only one use, or neither use.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by Urpriest View Post
    D&D 3.5 doesn't work without knowledge checks. There are lots of monsters that have abilities that will destroy a party that doesn't expect them, and that aren't immediately evident from their description.

    In a high lethality game like 2nd end and earlier, you can get rid of knowledge checks because if the mystery monster kills a character it's no big deal. In a more forgiving game the characters can take a few rounds to make mistakes and figure out the monster's abilities, and there is a sense of discovery. D&D 3.5 is neither of those games: combat is fast, characters are detailed and take effort to create, and "discovering a new monster" often means a character will die.
    Now this is an interesting answer....

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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by Urpriest View Post
    D&D 3.5 doesn't work without knowledge checks. There are lots of monsters that have abilities that will destroy a party that doesn't expect them, and that aren't immediately evident from their description.

    In a high lethality game like 2nd end and earlier, you can get rid of knowledge checks because if the mystery monster kills a character it's no big deal. In a more forgiving game the characters can take a few rounds to make mistakes and figure out the monster's abilities, and there is a sense of discovery. D&D 3.5 is neither of those games: combat is fast, characters are detailed and take effort to create, and "discovering a new monster" often means a character will die.
    Not sure I agree about the game not working without Knowledge checks. Many a game has been played with all stupid characters.

    And I totally disagree about the mystery-custom-monster-only-found-in-one-place-in-the-multiverse-and-just-recently-dumped-in-a-village-near-you meaning certain annihilation for the party. Cautious players, which I try to cultivate, will test out the waters of a "this is some kind of rare beast indeed"-type encounters. Unraveling mysteries not covered in books or seminars is also part of the game, and I find that rewarding Int-based characters for new discoveries can also be very rewarding.

    On a slightly different note, I did find the psionic power hypercognition to be a little bit of a plot-exorcisist. One campaign I ran had a soulknife with psion seer cohort. She derailed a number of mysterious events and subplots by just manifesting that power. Granted, high level divinations are made to bypass normal research, but I was always caught off guard by this one for some reason.

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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    There are a lot of things you can do in game without knowledge checks, but every once in a while you'll run up against a wall.

    I was with a group that came up against a Quasit and, without knowledge (planes) we couldn't have figured out that we needed Cold Iron or Good Aligned weapons(though, needing invisibility purge was kind of obvious).

    When we came up against a Flesh Golem, it was helpful to be able to retreat and buy adamantine weapons after a knowledge check.

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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by Phelix-Mu View Post
    Not sure I agree about the game not working without Knowledge checks. Many a game has been played with all stupid characters.

    And I totally disagree about the mystery-custom-monster-only-found-in-one-place-in-the-multiverse-and-just-recently-dumped-in-a-village-near-you meaning certain annihilation for the party. Cautious players, which I try to cultivate, will test out the waters of a "this is some kind of rare beast indeed"-type encounters. Unraveling mysteries not covered in books or seminars is also part of the game, and I find that rewarding Int-based characters for new discoveries can also be very rewarding.

    On a slightly different note, I did find the psionic power hypercognition to be a little bit of a plot-exorcisist. One campaign I ran had a soulknife with psion seer cohort. She derailed a number of mysterious events and subplots by just manifesting that power. Granted, high level divinations are made to bypass normal research, but I was always caught off guard by this one for some reason.

    Never again.
    See, custom monsters are different in that as the DM you can tailor them to the players capabilities and fears. You can make sure that, given however cautious the players happen to be, they will have enough time to figure it out, and you can make sure that the monster's appearance is such that they will be inspired to exercise caution. Plenty of published monsters don't have those attributes.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by Urpriest View Post
    See, custom monsters are different in that as the DM you can tailor them to the players capabilities and fears. You can make sure that, given however cautious the players happen to be, they will have enough time to figure it out, and you can make sure that the monster's appearance is such that they will be inspired to exercise caution. Plenty of published monsters don't have those attributes.
    Actually, I usually ambush pcs with near-death experiences involving mistaken identity early on, since murder-mystery stuff really only works at low levels and is among my favorite setups for an adventure. "Look! the corpse bears wounds from the bite of a wolf." I think you can see where this is going; it wasn't the wolf.

    At some point, a seemingly interaction encounter goes wrong, or in the middle of the fight with the enemy soldier, a hideous parasitic demon explodes from it's torso. It's not that I don't allow Knowledge checks. I just limit them to what is observable in the monster at hand, and I will occasionally make said appearances or behaviors misleading. Once the real fight is revealed, then I guess Knowledge checks are fine, though I do have a personal soft spot for aiming at the party weak spots, as much to make them aware of their weakness as to challenge them in combat. Steel tested in fire blah blah.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    To be perfectly honest I almost never run into players using Knowledge Checks to ID Monsters. I know it exists, it's a thing. I see it mentioned in rules and such. Just players never use it.

    I imagine because mostly they are used to just metagaming knowledge. "It's a Red Dragon." No one is gonna waste time rolling Knowledge to figure out it flies, breathes fire, can cast spells and such.

    Until something weird happens because I homebrew abut 90% of my monsters and they see the Red Dragon spitting out Acid Baths. At which point they still usually don't Knowledge Check but just run with it. Least in my experience with several different groups over the years.

    Instead I usually have them rolling Knowledge Checks to basically do Bardic Lore, or to try and short cut a non-combat encounter as per the OP's example.
    Last edited by ArcturusV; 2013-01-30 at 10:35 PM.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by ArcturusV View Post
    I imagine because mostly they are used to just metagaming knowledge. "It's a Red Dragon." No one is gonna waste time rolling Knowledge to figure out it flies, breathes fire, can cast spells and such.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by ArcturusV View Post
    That is misrepresenting what I was saying quite a bit. If you look at the description of the example? That could be magic (Arcana), it could be extra-planar (The Planes), it could be the result of a cursing (Religion), or it could be a variation of a simple fountain with an unusual alchemical liquid (Architecture and Engineering). And it's NOT obvious which of those it is. Not at all.
    What? So if it could be any of those things the gm should tell each player who has ranks and makes the knowledge check exactly what some one with that knowledge would think it is. I've had encounters (similar to the fountain example) where 3-4 characters had in my world applicable but opposite knowledge each thought there idea was correct... Then the group figured out through trial and error(ya know like what every one has been saying they want).

    To be honest if your GM lets you get through an encounter with a single knowledge check(and this happens consistently) they may need to touch up on what knowledge's do.. Personally I view this as poor GMing and would probably say something to the GM.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by Vorr View Post
    The involved group game:Slowly, the entire group approaches the strange pool of liquid, careful not to get close. Player 1:I waste 1 hour of play time going through the exact same routine we do for every mystery pool/portal/substance
    This is why I <3 Knowledge checks.

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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by ArcturusV View Post
    And I personally cringe every time a player goes, "Okay, what knowledge skill do I need to roll to know about..." If you as a player can't figure out if Knowledge (The Planes) or Knowledge (Architecture) applies then how would your character know if he's looking at something extra-planar or just a feat of neat engineering? Try one or the other and give me a reason why you think that. Even if it's wrong it might still reveal stuff.
    1. Sorry, but your ability to describe things will always be inferior to my character's ability to experience the world with their 5+ senses.

    2. I don't have Knowledge X, at least not at the level of many characters.
    Last edited by Hand_of_Vecna; 2013-01-30 at 11:46 PM.

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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by Hand_of_Vecna View Post
    1. Sorry, but your ability to describe things will always be inferior to my character's ability to experience the world with their 5+ senses.
    Ditto. I'm amazed at how many DMs actually want to play "Guess what I'm thinking" instead of, you know, D&D.

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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Maybe. Though it's also annoying as a DM to have a player in a roleplaying game say "Okay, how would my character act?" to the DM. We have a lot of stuff to run as is.

    Not that I said they have to play "Guess what I'm thinking". I said they had to give a justification then roll it. And I would base what they get off the justification and how the roll came out, requiring them to take a bit of time to engage me, perhaps ask questions and show me what they are thinking. Rather than me telling them what they think.

    That's a lot different than someone going, "Okay DM... what do I need to do this scene?" which is what I was talking about.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Because my character lives in this world, and knows about its inhabitants and dangers. Knowledge checks represent the likelihood of knowing a particular thing.

    A real life example: Suppose I'm walking through some prairie in Africa, and I see in my way a big gray lumpy monster with a white spike on it. With enough examination, I determine it's a Rhinoceros, a giant angry short-sighted best which charges anyone who gets too close. I know these qualities about it almost entirely through popular media, all told precisely because the Rhino is so deadly and well-known for slaughtering unwary passers-by. I have also acquired similar information about elephants, scorpions, gorillas, firearms, rocket launchers, nuclear missiles, and other things well-known for killing people in seconds. For example, I know that firearms kick upward, informing me that keeping low should help against them.


    In a similar fashion, people in a D&D universe would try to keep up-to-date on the myriad scary monsters which can slaughter them in seconds (And they aren't fairy tales. They're real, measurable and discrete: like Rhinos, elephants, and scorpions. You can walk up to a demon and poke it if you want. Someone has surely taken time to study all these monsters and spread the knowledge). They would learn because of safety concerns and wonder at such beasts and their power. They would be acquainted with the most common and famous threats, believe it or not, because people learn basic survival tips without needing formal education.
    Last edited by Slipperychicken; 2013-01-31 at 12:05 AM.

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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by ArcturusV View Post
    Not that I said they have to play "Guess what I'm thinking". I said they had to give a justification then roll it.
    The justification is my character has ranks in Knowledge: Arcana, Dungeoneering, and The Planes, and therefore knows what to look for.

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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by ArcturusV View Post
    Instead I usually have them rolling Knowledge Checks to basically do Bardic Lore, or to try and short cut a non-combat encounter as per the OP's example.
    That, ah... sounds like your players aren't interested in the "guess what this mystery liquid" encounters. In which case the DM should probably stop using those encounters.

    In cases where the players are interested in them, don't give away the entire mystery with one check. Instead, have the checks give clues, the same as tossing a coin in. Knowledge (The Planes)? Well, that black good is extra-dimensional. Maybe from the Shadow Plane. Knowledge (Arcana)? Looks like someone used some sort of conjuration ritual. Unless someone has an abnormally high score, I figure that the obscurity of the effect is similar to the power of the group-- stronger parties will run into weirder, less well-known stuff, if only because it tends to kill most people who poke it.

    A final point-- just because you know what something is, doesn't mean you know what to do about it. OK, so the players now know that the strange black waterfall is extraplanar matter from the Plane of Shadows. Great! Now how are you going to get past it?

    EDIT: Oh, and let's not forget the DM's favorite use of knowledge skills-- info dumping. Have some cool/important setting information to share? Who has Knowledge (Local)? (The Dresden Files RPG actually has this as an explicit use of the Scholarship skill)
    Last edited by Grod_The_Giant; 2013-01-31 at 12:23 AM.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by Grod_The_Giant View Post
    OK, so the players now know that the strange black waterfall is extraplanar matter from the Plane of Shadows. Great! Now how are you going to get past it?
    By walking around it? In the OP's description, the black sludge is just kind of...there.
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by Flickerdart View Post
    By walking around it? In the OP's description, the black sludge is just kind of...there.
    So... it's just pretty scenery? In that case, I think the knowledge check is exactly what you want-- you can convey the flavor, and you don't sidetrack the game for 20 minutes tossing rocks into an extradimensional portal.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Grod_The_Giant View Post
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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by Flickerdart View Post
    By walking around it? In the OP's description, the black sludge is just kind of...there.
    Which tends to be the pattern for puzzles that are defeated with a knowledge check; they're ultimately pointless. True puzzles/mysteries not only survive knowledge checks, but often get more interesting after those checks are made.

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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Ok, first thing first :

    Your way of playing is not the only way.

    second:

    Just because peoples play a different way, does not mean they play ''wrong''



    The ''game theory'' you point out is non-sense, being a casual gamer does not mean you don't care about the game or that it's odd you have time for games in your busy life. It means you play games in a more casual, relaxed format. Often, but not always, playing less serious games.

    It also doesn't mean that you can't put 1+1 together or that you are lazy and don't want to make effort.

    Please, don't assume that peoples don't want to make any effort or take any time to figures things simply because they prefer a different playstyle then yours.

    Quote Originally Posted by Vorr View Post
    So the question comes down to, why are so many players obsessed with sucking the fun out of the game and ruining it, just so they can ''know everything''? I just don't get it.
    The reason you don't get it is that, while it may suck all the fun and ruin your games for you. This is not the case for many (if not most) peoples.

    Other have pointed good uses of knowledge checks, You have to remember that while it seems like you prefer games about discovery and figuring things out, not everyone does. Some prefers to rush to the battle, others like intra-party conflicts, other games are all about the story, there's a lot of way to play DnD, not one is right.
    Last edited by ko_sct; 2013-01-31 at 12:54 AM.

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    Default Re: One Roll to Know it All

    Quote Originally Posted by ArcturusV View Post
    Though it's also annoying as a DM to have a player in a roleplaying game say "Okay, how would my character act?" to the DM. We have a lot of stuff to run as is.

    Not that I said they have to play "Guess what I'm thinking". I said they had to give a justification then roll it.
    I would counter that I'm not asking "How would my character act?" I'm asking "What does my character's particular set of skills mean they know?" Then, and only then, can I tell you what my character would do.

    Honestly I, get where your coming from with justification, but how long will it be before you get tired of hearing "Well, my character reads a lot. You probably remember that I often mention going to libraries and booksellers once more pressing party business has been attended to and read them when I'm on watch or waiting around for any number of reasons. You may also recall that I said I was going to sit up for awhile talking with the woodsman when we stopped at his cabin for the night and he may have mentioned something pertinent." five times a session?

    Personally, I recommend keeping track of character's Knowledge skills just like many DMs do with Spot, Listen or Perception. Then you can add bits yourself in the initial description adding that this or that bit of insight is the result of so and so's Knowledge Arcana or what's her face's keen eyes.
    Last edited by Hand_of_Vecna; 2013-01-31 at 01:00 AM.

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