Not sure if this has been asked elsewhere, but a lengthy search turned up nothing. Currently playing in a homebrew campaign where the party bard has redonkulous bonuses to every possible knowledge skill. Every time we fight a new enemy, he attempts a knowledge check to determine if the creature has weaknesses, immunities, etc. The GM refuses to tell him which knowledge skill to roll (arcana, religion, etc), saying that he has to simply choose one and see what happens. There have also been instances where the GM has made up the monster from scratch, and claims that no knowledge check could possibly reveal anything about the creature.
I realize this particular use of the knowledge skills is one that gets houseruled a lot, and that in the end everything is up to the GM's discretion. However, I am curious as to how this is "supposed" to work. I am a newbie GM and run my own campaign, where I tend to try to stick close to the rules. I usually simply tell the players which skill check they need to roll.
So what is the "right" way, or at least the one most commonly accepted? What are the rules on this in a PFS game?
You should be told which skill to roll on.
The game mechanical roll is to tell if your character recognizes the creature and what they know about such a creature.
A unique creature may not be recognizable, but you may be able to extrapolate from creatures that you do know about. "Well, it looks like a construct except it is made from a different material than any I've seen before and the joints seem to be backwards."
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Basically there are three DC's possible:
1) 5 + CR (common)
2) 10 + CR (uncommon/standard)
3) 15 + CR (particularly rare/unique)
For me, the general rule of thumb in this is that most monsters will be (2). If a monster is particularly well known, or encountered by civilized people a lot, it becomes a (1). If something is rare, or there is a lot of misinformation about it, it might be (3).
Some GM's adhere to the concept that hiding information makes the game more exciting. If it works for them, more power to them, for my tastes I prefer to just put things on the table.
As for "making a knowledge check", it is literally no action.
Action
Usually none. In most cases, a Knowledge check doesn't take an action (but see “Untrained,” below).
Retry? No. The check represents what you know, and thinking about a topic a second time doesn’t let you know something that you never learned in the first place.
So, rolling your Knowledge (Arcana) and your Knowledge (Planes) during the same time is entirely legit within the rules. It also does NOT violate the Retry portion, because they are separate skills and not the same skill.
When I GM, I tell people which skill to roll. I generally assume that discerning the difference between types of monsters is a DC 0 check (it'd be a DC 0 to tell the difference between a Dragon and an Ooze, and thus know which skill to roll).
Heck, if someone maxes out ranks in Knowledge skill, I will often set aside things to tell them about various things (not just monsters, but monsters included) without them having to roll. If they want to know more, or figure out something useful with that information, they then have to roll.
This makes sense now! I totally missed the part where it said that most knowledge checks don't require an action. The party bard thought it was a standard action, so that was why he was concerned about the situation. Thanks for the responses, these answer my question perfectly.
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Not sure if this has been asked elsewhere, but a lengthy search turned up nothing. Currently playing in a homebrew campaign where the party bard has redonkulous bonuses to every possible knowledge skill. Every time we fight a new enemy, he attempts a knowledge check to determine if the creature has weaknesses, immunities, etc. The GM refuses to tell him which knowledge skill to roll (arcana, religion, etc), saying that he has to simply choose one and see what happens. There have also been instances where the GM has made up the monster from scratch, and claims that no knowledge check could possibly reveal anything about the creature.
I realize this particular use of the knowledge skills is one that gets houseruled a lot, and that in the end everything is up to the GM's discretion. However, I am curious as to how this is "supposed" to work. I am a newbie GM and run my own campaign, where I tend to try to stick close to the rules. I usually simply tell the players which skill check they need to roll.
So what is the "right" way, or at least the one most commonly accepted? What are the rules on this in a PFS game?
The bold section here annoys me. By that I mean when a GM runs it that way. The whole point of knowledge is about if you know something about it. You shouldn't have to "guess" at which knowledge to roll, it should be an automatic thing imo. "Anyone got knowledge X?"
Anyways, apologies for the rant, this sort of thing really irks me.
Dino, I'm with you! +1
I feel the GM isn't going to like when the bard starts doing all the knowledge checks for free for each badguy until he gets it right.
Have to agree with DinosuarsOnIce. Between that and the rest of what the OP said, it really seems like the GM just doesn't want players knowing anything about the monsters they face regardless of how good their knowledge skills are.
I feel the GM isn't going to like when the bard starts doing all the knowledge checks for free for each badguy until he gets it right.
That wont change anything, since only one knowledge check out of them could be a success, with the others being automatic failures.
If the GM already having the Bard guess, and use a standard action to even try, getting all the knowledge checks for free will probably bother the GM.
If the GM already having the Bard guess, and use a standard action to even try, getting all the knowledge checks for free will probably bother the GM.
It'd bother me as a player if a GM forced me to take actions for something that isn't even a free action, since it'd be a house rule just to screw with the players. So, either way, someone's going to be bothered.
As for "making a knowledge check", it is literally no action.
So, rolling your Knowledge (Arcana) and your Knowledge (Planes) during the same time is entirely legit within the rules. It also does NOT violate the Retry portion, because they are separate skills and not the same skill.
Except it says that you can't retry for a single topic. "Thinking about it a second time doesn't let you know something that you never learned in the first place". Using two Knowledge skills on the same topic doesn't make sense. If you don't know it the first time, you don't know it. Knowledge skills don't represent separate repositories of things you learned, they represent everything you know. You can't check the Arcana compartment, come up empty, and hope its in the Planes compartment. That makes absolutely no sense. If the retry was involving a different or more specific aspect of the original topic, that might pass because it is basically a new topic.
I also don't think this will pass RAW, because Knowledge is listed as a single skill in the skill descriptions.
Except it says that you can't retry for a single topic. "Thinking about it a second time doesn't let you know something that you never learned in the first place". Using two Knowledge skills on the same topic doesn't make sense. If you don't know it the first time, you don't know it. Knowledge skills don't represent separate repositories of things you learned, they represent everything you know. You can't check the Arcana compartment, come up empty, and hope its in the Planes compartment. That makes absolutely no sense. If the retry was involving a different or more specific aspect of the original topic, that might pass because it is basically a new topic.
I also don't think this will pass RAW, because Knowledge is listed as a single skill in the skill descriptions.
Except it's intended that you just roll the one your meant to, iirc your GM is meant to be the one who rolls it, so you firstly don't know the roll type or whether the roll was successful or not.
So if they are forced to not know what knowledge they are meant to use, letting them roll all is the only reasonable course of action.
Even flavourwise, since knowledge is one lump thing. You don't pick what type of knowledge your searching through. You don't go, hmm... "do I know about this [search arcana files]." It's "do I know about this [check all my knowledge]."
As for "making a knowledge check", it is literally no action.
So, rolling your Knowledge (Arcana) and your Knowledge (Planes) during the same time is entirely legit within the rules. It also does NOT violate the Retry portion, because they are separate skills and not the same skill.
Except it says that you can't retry for a single topic. "Thinking about it a second time doesn't let you know something that you never learned in the first place". Using two Knowledge skills on the same topic doesn't make sense. If you don't know it the first time, you don't know it. Knowledge skills don't represent separate repositories of things you learned, they represent everything you know. You can't check the Arcana compartment, come up empty, and hope its in the Planes compartment. That makes absolutely no sense. If the retry was involving a different or more specific aspect of the original topic, that might pass because it is basically a new topic.
I also don't think this will pass RAW, because Knowledge is listed as a single skill in the skill descriptions.
The way this works is that if I see a car I would roll my knowledge(car) check to know that it is a 67 Mustang. I would not roll my knowledge(cell phone) check. The intent is to see if the player knows the information. Otherwise if you see an elf in the game you might have to guess to use knowledge (local) or knowledge(nature), and not even know that the shopkeeper is an elf instead of a gnome. By the rules you would have to roll, but most GM's just handwave it.
Also if knowledge is really one skill then you would not need a different skill rank per topic, and someone would be proficient(aka it is a class skill) in all knowledge skills or none of them. The rules tells you what your class skills are, not what your class subtopics are.
Each Knowledge skill is separate and distinct.
I roll Knowledge (Religion) and fail. I cannot roll Knowledge (Religion) again on that topic.
I can roll Knowledge (History) though, because it isn't a retry. It cannot possibly be a retry, because I didn't roll Knowledge (History) yet, which is a completely separate skill from Knowledge (Religion).
Just like failing any other skill check does not prevent you from rolling a different skill to try and achieve your goal. Since the skills are different, the retry clause does not come into effect, because it would be the FIRST try of that skill.
We know that Knowledge skills are distinct and separate skills for two major reasons:
1) Each must have it's own skill ranks spent on it, they do not share skill ranks.
2) If you take the feat Skill Focus, you'd need to take it separate times for each Knowledge skill you want it to apply to.
Therefore rolling Knowledge (History) would not be a retry of Knowledge (Religion), because they are separate and distinct and have no bearing on one another. Each check has no interaction.
There is an argument for not telling the player which skill to use, since that reveals information that the PC wouldn't actually know if he fails the roll.
That doesn't mean he should guess or have to roll all the knowledge skills, whether that takes actions or not. If it's that important, give the GM a list of your bonuses, make your roll and let him figure out which applies.
Or just tell the player which skill to use, and trust him to not metagame based on that.
If that's not why the GM is doing this and he's really just trying to make it harder to identify, then yes he's not doing it right.
I think the knowledge skill was ruining the GM's ability to hide what the monsters abilities were so he made up this new rule to counter it, along with the new monsters.
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Houserules ahoy (since this is an interesting topic, and the actual rules have already been covered).
Sometimes I will allow multiple knowledge skills to be used at varying DCs to allow the party to obtain certain types of information.
For example, a DC 10 Knowledge (Local) check might allow them to identify the towering humanoid in front of them as a troll. A DC 20 Knowledge (History) check would allow a character to recall a tale of a band of large green humanoids that attacked a local village a generation ago. Beating either of the checks by 5 would tell them that fire is an effective weapon (and probably acid, too, for the K(Local) check) and that otherwise the creature will heal rapidly from any wounds they inflict. The end result is effectively the same, but allows characters to invest in multiple skills across the party and not just focus on the monster identifying ones.
There is an argument for not telling the player which skill to use, since that reveals information that the PC wouldn't actually know if he fails the roll.
That doesn't mean he should guess or have to roll all the knowledge skills, whether that takes actions or not. If it's that important, give the GM a list of your bonuses, make your roll and let him figure out which applies.
Or just tell the player which skill to use, and trust him to not metagame based on that.
If that's not why the GM is doing this and he's really just trying to make it harder to identify, then yes he's not doing it right.
There really isn't an argument for not telling a player which skill they're using. For one, to identify the monster it isn't difficult to rule as the GM that the players need to be able to see it and something of note that would help identify it as what it is.
Knowledge (Planes) is not a replacement for Perception to notice that it isn't just a pile of rocks and is actually an Earth Elemental. Until it moves, it's just a pile of rocks. The handsome man with no mirrors in his house is just a guy with no mirrors, until he does something strange like try to bite your friends neck.
Speaking of vampires (or similarly disguised beings), it wouldn't be bad to either set the DC to identify their true selves the same as their disguise check, or add disguise modifiers to the overall DC to identify their true nature.
Local nobleman is 10+CR Knowledge (Local). If he's using disguise self, it becomes 20+CR to notice something truly strange, suggesting a Knowledge (religion) check is in order. I might continue adding the +10 until he does something obvious, like use a vampire-based natural attack or special ability. Or if he's a master of disguise, set them at his Disguise Self result.
I get the argument for making checks in secret when they're passive things the character might react to, like perception and sense motive checks that the DM wants to initiate, but the players haven't. In this case though, the player is actively doing something and IMO the DM is required to tell them what they are purposely trying to use to engage with the rules.
Passive (initiated by DM) in secret is fine, though I personally rarely if ever do that.
Active (initiated by player) they should know what they're doing.
There are ways to present it as hidden information, and it might require some creativity and paying attention to the rules, but you don't need to keep what skill a player is actively trying to use a secret from them.
It's not a passive skill. The player declares they're trying to identify the monster. If they don't, they don't get to roll.
IMO, it's not the DM's role to attempt to conceal mechanical information necessary to play the game. Having an NPC lie or tell half-truths is one thing. That's not the DM's job though as a participant in the game at the table. Be honest, upfront and open about what is happening mechanically.
If players are meta-gaming jackasses, they're going to be meta-gaming jackasses regardless. Instead of trying to outsmart them, either talk to them and deal with it, or excuse them from the table if it's that disruptive. Concealing game mechanics is not the way to do it.
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I'm going to defend the GM described in the OP... to a point at least.
Yes, I agree with posts upthread it's against the rules to allow the player to attempt only 1 knowledge check per round. I'll even add that it's bad GMing technique to have the player roll checks until the correct skill is declared. Not only is it a time sink with no fun for anyone involved, the player is likely to resort to "fine, I'll just roll for ALL of them.." after being told he used the wrong skill once or twice.
However, there are plenty of cases where simply knowing which skill is relevant is giving the player meta-information. Oh, that normal-looking bear isn't knowledge/nature? Not even knowledge/arcana? Planes? What then? Oh, Religion? Reeeeeeeealllly. And I didn't identify it? Ok, out comes the cleric's holy symbol....
I disagree with the sentiment that "metagamers are gonna metagame". I'll prevent it where I can, and I'll put a stop to it where I can't prevent it. With that mindset, I resolve monster knowledge checks by allowing the player to decree which skill they think is appropriate, based on the context of the encounter. If they're right, I have them go ahead and roll. If the monster isn't that category, I ask for the character sheet and have them roll. I then look up what the result is on the relevant skill and proceed.
I do it that way for several reasons. Primarily, it suppresses meta-gaming by preventing the info from even coming out if the check is not successful (if the player already knows exactly what the monster is anyway, preventing metagaming on that knowledge is a tangential discussion and not relevant here). This particular measure gives the player the relevant info with virtually no more table time spent than just announcing the creature type "for free". It also gives positive reinforcement to the player: there is the satisfaction of the reward of having correctly paid attention to the game thus far/ been clever enough to intuit the correct monster type.
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The GM has every right to simply get a notecard with all of the player's knowledge skill modifiers and ask for the die result, then determine the result himself. It sounds like the GM is picking the worst of all possible solutions.
If you're worried about players metagaming the information it's well within the rules to ask relevant players (those possessing the skill) to roll a d20 and you add that value to their listed knowledge skill. All it requires is for you to ask for them to write down their knowledge skills and modifiers.
This way if they don't learn anything they don't gain metainformation.
Though typically I rule that if you have ranks in a knowledge skill you can identify the creature type even if you don't know specifics about that creature. I will even remind you of the general things about that creature type. Why? Because it's always accurate for all creatures of that type. Some creatures lose or gain immunities that normal creatures of that type have. But if you recognize a shadow, there is no reason why your know(religion) shouldn't be able to tell you a Greater Shadow is also an Undead, even if it's one you fail to identify.
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I think the Knowledge section needs a tiny update to reflect one fact: The initial not-research knowledge check is not an action, nor even a real check. It's just a way to determine what your character already knows in a random fashion that's weighed by your character's knowledge skill.
You *never* make the player pick which knowledge for such checks, they always use the highest applicable knowledge and the DM is to tell them which are applicable. This is a derived truth from the fact above.
If the player is spending some actual time looking over or studying something to figure it out and you want a knowledge check for it, THEN they have to pick the knowledge check to use since they are putting some non-zero active effort towards it. Knowledge checks to identify a creature through autopsy would do this, as would knowledge checks supported by spending time doing research in a library. Using Knowledge (Religion) to identify the bone golem while piecing through it's body? Your answer is, at best, "not actually an undead". If the player then asks for Arcana they could get the real answer. But in both cases they only had to declare because (presumably) their initial knowledge check failed and they needed to study the problem further.
If you're worried about players metagaming the information it's well within the rules to ask relevant players (those possessing the skill) to roll a d20 and you add that value to their listed knowledge skill. All it requires is for you to ask for them to write down their knowledge skills and modifiers.
This way if they don't learn anything they don't gain metainformation.
Though typically I rule that if you have ranks in a knowledge skill you can identify the creature type even if you don't know specifics about that creature. I will even remind you of the general things about that creature type. Why? Because it's always accurate for all creatures of that type. Some creatures lose or gain immunities that normal creatures of that type have. But if you recognize a shadow, there is no reason why your know(religion) shouldn't be able to tell you a Greater Shadow is also an Undead, even if it's one you fail to identify.
But there are cases where it's not so obvious what the creature type is.
Sure, it's a pretty good guess that Greater Shadows will share some traits with Shadows. It's also a pretty good guess that the Bone Golem is undead, like skeletons. It's just wrong.
Very true, but I also like to give my players the general creature type stats if they're relevant. Its certainly not in the rules, but my idea is basically that a trained (at least 1 skill rank) person can identify when something is of the correct type for their knowledge to apply based on something about the creature. Even if they don't know anything about that specific creature. It might be simple clues like sinew rope holding the parts together in the case of a bone golem (instead of being a skeleton) or maybe they lack the inner negative energy of undead (more an RP thing and an association of undead with negative energy) and you can sense such things in creatures. You could flavor it a lot of ways. And I like to be generous. If it doesn't work for you, no need to do it. Personally, I don't feel knowing the type helps all that much. Except that my new players don't waste spells because they don't really know that many different types of creatures have resistances to mind-effect or other spells, and I would rather tell them so they don't waste spells futilely because they don't know when to hold back or reserve something when they're unsure.