Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 royinator Oct 08, 2014 15:33:47	This may be to meta-/video-gamey for DND, but my players always want to know what their characters knows about the monster they see before them.   So far I've been letting them roll Arcana, Nature, or Relgion checks (based on the type of monster, i.e. undead = Religion) when they first see the monster as a free/non- action with a DC 10 to know the monster's name, DC 15 to have a rough idea of its actions (i.e. a vampire will bite people and steal their vitality), and a DC 20 to know its vulnerabilites/resistances/immunities. They can always take an action to try the skill check again.   Recently I've looked back and wanted to incorporate proficiency into this check, (characters proficient in the skill automatically know something about monsters of that type?) and I wanted to know if a system like htis already exists, others had systems like this in their games, if my DCs are too low/high, etc. Thanks for reading!
#2 iserith Oct 08, 2014 15:52:25	When a player describes an action that amounts to them trying to recall lore about a monster, I ask them for their intent i.e. what exactly they want to know. Because assuming we're in a scene where the monster has turned up, I've already described the thing and telegraphed its badness. This alone is generally enough to deduce what it can do, what it likely resists or is immune to, and what it might be vulnerable to without requiring a check. This is just me doing the whole "The DM describes the environment" thing.   So let's say the player then describes his action to recall lore and tells me his intent is to get some hard numbers to back up his assumptions. Fair enough. So I ask myself whether the monster is an iconic D&D monster or something more obscure. If it's iconic (you know, a beholder, a dragon, a troll, a roper, etc.), then there's no check. I just give the player the information he wants to know and ask him how his character knows it. (My intent by asking is to get him to flesh out his character a bit by establishing new details.)   If I dont' think it's iconic, then I start thinking about what happens if the player fails the check. Okay, it's a nothic which I don't think is particularly iconic... it's got this cool ability where it steals secrets which could make for a cool failure condition. Now I make the player an offer: "I'll tell you what you want to know if you roll a DC 15 Intelligence check. If you fail, I'm going to tell you what you want to know, but the creature will steal a secret from your mind. You'll tell me what it is and it gets advantage on its first attack roll or contest against you. Deal?" If the player accepts the deal, then he rolls and we play to find out what happens.   I tend to go with a DC 15 because it's a medium DC and that seems about right. A low-level adventurer has probably at most around a 50/50 chance of recall which improves with experience. Succeed or fail, I'm going to give the player the information he wants, only failure is going to come at a cost that speaks to the monster's nature and creates a little tension. I don't see any point in rolling dice if failure isn't interesting.   I also have no problem whatsoever with a player using his skills and knowledge to his advantage, should he know something about a monster. If Ragnar whips out a torch even though his character has never fought a troll during a game, I'm perfectly okay with that. As above, I may ask Ragnar's player to tell me how Ragnar knows this to give him an opportunity to flesh out his character by establishing new details about him.
#3 pukunui Oct 08, 2014 16:00:04	What Iserith said.   For what it's worth, I recently asked Greg Bilsland what skill to use for undead knowledge, and he said he'd use either Arcana or Religion, depending on the specific undead creature. (My current PC is an "undead hunter" based on the Diablo III demon hunter class.)
#4 GrrHero Oct 08, 2014 16:02:37	I do the same, royinator. If you need any idea as to how much information to give out(which I think your system is pretty sound) the 4th edition monster manuals have creatures' backgrounds, and what DC the player needs to roll to know it.
#5 Ansbach Oct 08, 2014 18:31:57	http://community.wizards.com/forum/dungeon-master-help/threads/4149176#new
#6 eleran Oct 08, 2014 19:13:41	iserith wrote:
#7 iserith Oct 08, 2014 21:08:56	"Lumbering from the tunnel at the back of the cave they come - green freakish monsters, all tooth and claw and rage. One of them curses in what sounds like Giant and smashes the brazier into the wall with a deformed leg, grinning toothily as it puts out the fire. The other rushes forward to savage you, crashing heedlessly through stalagmites, unfazed by the gashes the sharp rocks open in its flesh - wounds that would be grievous to a man close up and become scars before your eyes. What do you do?"   Trolls. Here I've telegraphed that their primary attacks are claws and bite, that they speak Giant, that they didn't like the fire, and that they have regeneration. From here an experienced player can use that information to justify his character's tactics if he wants. An inexperienced player could have his character try to recall knowledge to confirm any assumptions. Since this is what I would consider an iconic creature, I would not say the character's action was uncertain and thus there would be no roll.
(Reply to #2) Ashrym	iserith wrote:
#9 iserith Oct 08, 2014 21:33:15	Ashrym wrote:
#10 Ansbach Oct 08, 2014 21:35:36	Ashrym wrote:
(Reply to #9) Ashrym	iserith wrote:
(Reply to #7) EzechielDantan	iserith wrote:
#13 iserith Oct 09, 2014 5:52:18	Ashrym wrote:
#14 iserith Oct 09, 2014 5:57:40	EzechielDantan wrote:
(Reply to #14) Ashrym	iserith wrote:
#16 BW0222 Oct 09, 2014 11:11:10	While I love iserith's description... it is a bit too much information for a few seconds at the beginning of the round, nor do I feel the need to give away monster abilities.   Typically, when players first see a monster, I'll simply make an ad-hoc determination if any of the characters would outright know what it is. This can be based off languages, race, classes, and background, religion, etc. plus of course them actually having encountered them before. A hunter likely knows what a dire badger is. A cleric of a sea god likely knows what a mermaid is. etc. No need to roll. I'll typically give it to that player first. (In fact I'm assuming a DC of 10 for a common monster, giving that player an advantage, and then using a passive check). If they recognize it, I'll give its name and some really basic information -- badgers are really agressive, mermaids often charm sailors to their deaths, etc.   If no one immediately recognizes it, then I'll assume a DC of typically 15 and players can roll an arcanum, nature, or religion. roll to see if they have heard about it. If the monster is really obsure, I'll make it a DC 20 check. If a character has a background, class ability, language, etc. which is related to it, then I'll simply give the character an advantage on the roll. A dwarf speaking giant, likely knows about trolls. A sylvan elf likely knows about pixies. etc. Again, if they recognize it, I'll give its name and some really basic information (often fluffy, legend, or not necessarily accurate) -- badgers are really agressive, mermaids often charm sailors and drown them, pixies can become invisible and like music, etc. The check is both to know if they have heard of the creature and whether they recognize it as such. If they roll really low... I'll occationally give them a false creature. If they roll close, I'll give them something general, but not the specific creature -- i.e. its some type of undead or its something like a big wolverine but with funny stripes.   If they identify it, then I'll allow players, if they ask, to make specific rolls (one per turn, not requiring an action) to indentify a specific trait about them. If someone wants to know if certain weapons work against sketetons, how many dire wolves are typically in a pack, or whether sprites can attack while invisible... I'll allow a roll. I only allow one question per character turn and they may have to verbally share that information with other players. I'll allow any player to roll (even if they failed to identify it). A player might have heard about the monster, read about it, knows children's stories, etc. even if they didn't recognize it. After combat, players can take ten minutes, make a general roll, assist each other, and share information that they know to get a varied information about the creature.   I do not allow players to look at the MM during play. If a player can indentify a monster through its description... I'll give them some leeway on knowing what it is and its abilities. If a character takes an overt action using out-of-character knowledge, such as yelling out "It's an ice troll! It regenerates unless you use fire against it.", I'll rule that the characters don't know this and ask the player to ignore that action. Again, I give some leeway... if the character says "It looks like it is made of ice... maybe fire would work against it?" (even though I know the player knows it is an ice troll)... I'll still allow it. I'll error on the side of the player just to keep the game moving quickly. If any player actually knows what the creature is and explicticly roleplays not knowing... I'll give out extra XP for roleplaying at the end of the adventure. For example, a player knows it is a ghoul, but their character doesn't know and tries grappling it or a character makes a really low check and yells out "It's a diseased hobgoblin.". Good roleplaying.
#17 iserith Oct 09, 2014 11:26:07	Ashrym wrote:
#18 iserith Oct 09, 2014 11:33:45	BW0222 wrote:
#19 bawylie Oct 09, 2014 11:48:00	This is simple scene framing. The number of sentences isn't as much of an issue as how effectively relevent information is delivered.    Personally, I feel you need to describe the participants/monsters, hazards/features, and situation. You've got about 30 seconds to do it.    A cool trick is to embed description in action. Say Iserith's troll "sneeringly swats the burning torch into the dirt with a clawed hand" - now I've combined fire aversion and shown you a common attack. I could say a "green clawed hand with skin like tough leather" and now you get a measure of its AC in addition to its attack and fire aversion.
#20 bawylie Oct 09, 2014 11:50:54	I end up not requiring monster lore when I accurately describe my monsters.    In the past, one of my players wanted monster lore on every monster. It became SOP. But that's boring. And after some time I decided I had no value in preventing them from knowing the info, and no value in going through this process for every monster, every fight. That's when I started giving the info and learning to write better encounters.
#21 iserith Oct 09, 2014 12:48:08	"A growl and a flash of white out of the corner of your eye tells you that you're not alone in this fungal forest. Crawling through a cloud of poisonous spores is a vicious, white-furred biped clinging effortlessly to the rock wall with jagged fore and hind claws. It leaps toward you, howling to summon its brethren, revealing a drow symbol painted crudely on its matted fur. What do you do?"   Later... during the battle.   "With each strike on these beasts, their ferocity grows even as you pierce, hack, and bludgeon their flesh. As you push them closer to incapacitation and death, they hit back and harder than before."   What monster is this and what conclusions can you draw from these simple descriptions? If you were a player in this game, how would your character react? Would you try and recall knowledge about this creature to confirm your assumptions?
#22 bawylie Oct 09, 2014 13:08:45	While I can't guess the monster. I can tell it has some kind of climb speed, is allied with or controlled by drow (maybe elvish language will be of some use here), summons allies (though maybe that's situational), and will probably do more damage the closer to death it is.    Probably we should hunker into a defensive position, get the artillery behind the front line, and engage at a distance. If they come into melee range, I feel like grapple would be a good tactic - restrain their mobility and impose disadvantage (if we can get it) on their melee attacks.
#23 Illithidbix Oct 09, 2014 16:38:52	Might not suit your DM style but I'd go for:.   1) "Eh... whatever you feel you can justify with your character's skill proficiencies and background" - My players tend to be cool enough for me to not to worry about this, they're happy to roleplay ignorance.   2) "YOUR CHARACTER HAS NO IDEA! - And to reinforce this, you have no idea either!" If I think it should be a complete mystery for the characters then I shall make it easier for my players to avoid metagaming by making it a complete mystery for the player as well!  If I don't want them to know anything about the monster then I'll either reskin something so it has stats (with minor modifications) but an entirely different appearance.
(Reply to #8) crimfan07	Ashrym wrote:
#25 iserith Oct 10, 2014 7:25:42	crimfan07 wrote:
#26 bawylie Oct 10, 2014 7:41:10	Hey, to be fair, older editions DID ask for checks to handle every process. So it's not surprising people do that.    Its not the sexy new paradigm, but okay.    Lets skip the "when do you dice" question and ask ourselves "how do you recall things?" Me? I either remember or I dont. Initially. Given a little time, I can figure things out. But if I don't know, it takes me 20 min to an hour to get myself educated (and only that littl because I have all the world's information accessible in my phone). So, even if there's a binary "you know/don't know," the act of requiring information tends to be a matter of time.    Now let's look at the Playtest. At one point, we HAD lore checks. Robust ones! But in the final product, they're absent (pending DMG). We're they unpopular? Not useful? Idk. There's some reason they're not there. I suspect (but have no evidence for this) that they simply aren't a good fit.  Because they tend not to facilitate: they wall off. Lore checks ensure your character might know something in their field of study. In practice, once you have a field of study many DMs aren't going to permit you to stray too far. It truncates possibility instead of enhancing.    And last, let's see it in practice. When I had lore checks (and players spamming them), when the first player failed, the person with the next highest INT tried. And on and on. In the end, my players didn't want to be inadvertently Gotcha!d by missing out on an ability or immunity.    To sum: lore checks serve nothing, limit possibilities, and people only make them for insurance vs malicious DM-ing. I'm as fine with skipping this as I am fine with skipping characters' morning bathroom routines.
#27 iserith Oct 10, 2014 7:42:26	Illithidbix wrote:
(Reply to #25) crimfan07	iserith wrote:
#29 Beldak_Serpenthelm Oct 10, 2014 10:03:01	royinator wrote:
(Reply to #29) bawylie	Beldak_Serpenthelm wrote:
#31 Saelorn Oct 10, 2014 11:54:05	It's not video gamey at all! In a video game, you would absolutely know all of that stuff (if you want to), where in this game you only know it if your character actually would know it.   If there's something about the enemy that is relevant to the encounter - some special ability that might sway the outcome of the fight - then it's only sporting to figure out if the characters know this or not. If you just blindside the players with monster abilities that they couldn't have possibly foreseen in any way, then that's not terribly satisfying for either side. Since most characters are not exclusively hunters of obscure monsters, with encyclopedic knowledge of their various weaknesses, a skill check is the perfect way to represent this probability. (If your character is explicitly a hunter of obscure monsters, then I expect you to make a "monster hunter" background which grants proficiency in Arcana, Nature, and Religion.)   Those DCs seem spot on, too, though I might also restrict the check to those who might have a reason to know - if you're not from anywhere near yrthak territory, and you aren't something like a sage or bard (or monster hunter) who would have had a reasonable chance to have even heard of it, then you don't even get to make a check. (To put that in Iserith terms, the player declares a free action to recall lore about this critter, and the DM decides that the chance of success is zero so no roll is needed.)   I wouldn't allow a re-roll, though, no matter how much time you spend thinking about it. If you don't know it, because you never learned it, then no amount of remembering is going to help you.
#32 iserith Oct 11, 2014 18:39:35	bawylie wrote: