Knowledge checks to ID monsters

[Troacctid]

They would learn that the monsters are constructs, built out of [material] and animated by magic. Examining the craftsmanship might give them clues about who built it, if they succeed on appropriate skill checks, e.g. Knowledge (local) to recognize that this type of stone is common in [town name]'s quarry, and Gather Information in that town to learn that [bad guy name] was around buying up lots of stone.

[Wardog]

Others make heavy use of templates and other modifications to mix things up and keep the players on their toes. I've even encountered a DM who used Google Translate to 'rename' all of the monsters - he either used the actual name or a descriptive name that he then translated into different languages until he found one he liked. (Worgs were Zlovolk, which was Macedonian for Evil Wolf.) That particular DM also re-fluffed and altered the appearance of a lot of his monsters - leaving the stat blocs alone but otherwise rendering them unrecognizable.

I suppose even quite small changes to the appearence could help throw players off-track.

How much Knowledge: Dragons do you need to distinguish a Black Dragon from a melanistic Red Dragon?

[InvisibleBison]

I suppose even quite small changes to the appearence could help throw players off-track.

How much Knowledge: Dragons do you need to distinguish a Black Dragon from a melanistic Red Dragon?

Not very much; black dragons have distinctive facial horns that red dragons lack.

(Your point is valid; you just picked a bad example, and I'm too pedantic to not point it out.)

[Melcar]

The rules say that if you make a Knowledge check DC 13, you know one or two useful facts about a 3HD enemy. I think the rules were written assuming that only the DM has the monster manual.
In reality, if you give the players the name of a monster, they can look the whole thing up.

How do you handle it? If someone makes the 10+HD check do you just give them the name and let them look up the sheet entry? Or do you give them a partial description, and then give them the actual name at 20+HD? Or _______?

Its pretty easy.

DC 10 +HD is to recognize the monster, like: “oh that’s a red dragon” or “that there is the dreaded night hag”
If you then can get +5 or +10 higher then it becomes: “oh that’s a red dragon, its immune to fire, but takes double damage from frost” or “that there is the dreaded night hag, it has a disease filled bite, and has some spell like abilities”
For every 5 DC extra above the 10+HD; you simply give one more piece of information. If a player was to be handed the MM, then that person would have to roll a very high number. Something like DC 10+HD+50… there are so many things that constitute “a useful piece of information” so the DC would get very high for the player to get all the information… In my opinion.

[Knight Magenta]

I think the best way of judging knowledge checks it to take a look at how much luck/investment a roll represents.

A character's knowledge check will be, on average, 10.5 + ranks + 3 + int. The base DC of the check is 10 + CR + 5/extra-question So for a character that is not int based (say 12 int), we have a success rate of about 75% to get something. A roll of DC + 5 will be achieved with a 50% chance, +10 with 25%, and so on.

This means that when a player rolls a knowledge check at DC +10, this is actually a pretty rare occurrence, or represents significant investment in that skill. Either by having a high int, or investing feats. It seems pretty crappy to tell the player "oh the troll also has rend" when that happens.

At our table, we usually split the monster's stat block into 3 parts across 2 categories: offense, defense. Each level of success lets you know about one of those parts. So exceeding the DC by 10 lets you know all relevant information about a monster. We don't really look at the statblock when this happens, cause that is boring, but the DM will give us the monster's good/bad save, its HD within 5 dice, etc...

[Der_DWSage]

Okay, my group has defeated 3 construct-type enemies. Someone has proposed examining the bodies to see what they can learn.

They already know damage output, special attacks, HP, Reflex save, and AC (+- a few points) from 3 rounds of combat. I'm really not sure what additional information there is to give aside from the actual monster info, which includes a couple of things that they wouldn't learn from examining the bodies (I think).

I still have baby sleep deprivation and can't figure this one out.

I think it'd help if you use my houserule for identifying monsters-it doesn't really do much more than codify the 'bits of information' that are given, and make it player-oriented instead of DM-oriented which information is given.

Spoiler: Identifying Monsters

Show

The following information is given automatically-The reach of an opponent, (Except in cases of the Lunge feat or similar, non-obvious means of gaining reach) the size of an opponent, and how many natural attacks it can make in a round.

If they make a DC 10 Knowledge check, they know the Type of the opponent-which includes any immunities from type (Such as a Dragon's immunity to sleep) and their good saves. By GM discretion, this can also include any information that is notorious for the species-such as a Troll's tendency to regenerate, or that a Red Dragon has a fire-based breath weapon.

If they make the actual knowledge check, and for every 5 points over the initial knowledge check, they may ask one question from the following.

Whether it is weak, strong, or neutral to a single element / A single non-elemental weakness, if any / How to overcome its DR / How much DR it has / Immunities to status effects that don’t come from its type / How many HD it has / 3 (Relevant) Spell-like abilities it knows / How much SR it has / Two (Relevant) special abilities or Special Qualities it has / Common diplomacy tactics against this creature (This includes what languages it speaks and what it eats)

You may want to adapt the DC 10 portion to a higher DC, but I felt it threw a bone to the people that don't invest anything-they at least know a Dragon when they see one, for example.

[Melcar]

This means that when a player rolls a knowledge check at DC +10, this is actually a pretty rare occurrence, or represents significant investment in that skill. Either by having a high int, or investing feats. It seems pretty crappy to tell the player "oh the troll also has rend" when that happens.

I kind of see your point, but again, theres is nothing wrong or strange in letting the academic types do the knowledge checks. I mean how many hours does the fighter on average spend in the library? Thats kind of how knowledge is dealt with in real life. So the wizard, or cloistered cleric could be doing the checks. And since the multiverse of D&D has so many different creatures its not a too harsh to think that its actually dificult to know what the 10 different trolls that all look alike has of abilities...