Climb DCs and Break DCs seem Contradictory and Illogical

[Jurassic Pratt]

So when my group first ran the playtest we couldn't find any rules or guidelines on the DC to break down doors in the CRB, but I just recently managed to find it on Page 7 of the Bestiary of all places. And what I found was definitely......concerning.

For one, the DC to break open a locked door is equal to the unlock Thievery DC+5 which just doesn't make sense. Regardless of how fancy of a lock you put on a wooden door, it's still a wooden door. The DC absolutely should not be based on the Thievery DC at all, but the size and type of material of the door.

However, this page also held something perhaps even stranger. It also provides DCs for climbing up walls of various materials, and they absolutely do not seem to match up with the CRB. On page 338 of the CRB we can see that climbing a cliff is a level 2 activity, which when we check the DC chart makes it DC 15. Now the bestiary puts climbing wood slats as a level 5 activity which is a whopping DC 21 and is harder than climbing a Masonry Wall apparently. Something is definitely wrong when climbing wood slats is significantly harder than climbing a cliffside and even slightly harder than a masonry wall.

Overall, it seems that quite a few of these DCs were decided without it being considered whether they logically made sense. I think it would definitely be a step in the right direction to revisit these rules and change the Break DC for doors to not be based on Thievery, and make the climb DCs more sensical for what surface you're climbing.

[John Lynch 106]

I've busted down a few doors in my time. Flimsy locks are definitely easier to break open then deadbolts. Whether it should have THAT much of a difference I don't know. But it should factor in it. Perhaps set the level of the lock+1 level for flimsy wood, +2 level for sturdy wood, +10 level for adamantine?

The playtest core rules also have conradictory DCs in them. Climbing a tree is a level 0 trivial task (DC 5), and yet the DC by level chart gives us DC 9 for a trivial level 0 task.

[Jurassic Pratt]

Basing the DC to break it down on the Thievery DC at all is problematic though. Because locks have diminishing returns and this makes it always harder to break down a door than pick the lock.

There's a point at which no matter what type of lock you put on your wooden door, it's still going to be just as easy to kick down because it's wood. and it's certainly not harder than picking it.

[DerNils]

I guess the reasoning is that bashing down the door would not be done with an Athletics Check, which is breaking the lock, but by damaging the door beyond it's hardness.

page 354 (hardness) gives guidance how to destroy doors:

The Hardness for doors, reinforced
structures, and other durable constructions is usually
twice the Hardness listed on the table.

Therefore a wooden door would have hardness 10 (5 doubled), and you would have to inflict either twice 20 damage or 30 in one go for it to be broken. It can then be discussed if a broken door is sufficient or if you need to go for destroyed.

This may indeed be easier than kicking the door down, depending on your damage Output.

[DM Livgin]

Locks: For a baseline assumption the quality of the door is similar to the quality of the lock. Poor door, poor lock. This is just a starting assumption that you can then modify for your game. If there is a really good lock on a really flimsy door, change the DCs.

What if the wood slats are smooth and tight fitted and the masonry is big blocks with good toe holds between the blocks? I think this is just a problem of imagining surfaces differently.

[Jurassic Pratt]

DerNils wrote:

page 354 (hardness) gives guidance how to destroy doors:

The Hardness for doors, reinforced
structures, and other durable constructions is usually
twice the Hardness listed on the table.

Therefore a wooden door would have hardness 10 (5 doubled), and you would have to inflict either twice 20 damage or 30 in one go for it to be broken. It can then be discussed if a broken door is sufficient or if you need to go for destroyed.

Putting aside the discussion of the DCs, I believe you may have just found a contradiction in the rules. Page 354 on the CRB says that you should double the hardness of doors and other reinforced objects (Assumedly walls and such), but page 7 of the bestiary has an entire section on demolishing objects and even table with their hardness and how many dents they can take, yet and makes absolutely no mention of ever doubling hardness.

I'm curious which one is meant to go by. Especially since the doubling hardness rule for doors means they'd basically be impossibly to tear down until high levels.

There's also still the looming issue of exactly when an object takes a dent, since the rules for it can be read 2 different ways.

[Jurassic Pratt]

Disregard the first part of the last post. I misread the rules and your message and thought it was saying to double the hardness of the door, not the hardness of the material the door is made of.

[Traiel]

if the door has hardness 10, then you only need 11 damage to dent it... it is only shields that absorb up to the damage in hardness first. Nothing to say that normal objects do that.

[Fuzzy-Wuzzy]

Traiel wrote:

if the door has hardness 10, then you only need 11 damage to dent it... it is only shields that absorb up to the damage in hardness first. Nothing to say that normal objects do that.

Everything does that.

page 175 wrote:

ITEM DAMAGE

An item can be destroyed if it takes damage enough times. An item reduces any damage dealt to it by its Hardness. The Hardness of various materials is explained in the Materials section on page 354. If an item takes damage equal to or exceeding the item’s Hardness, the item takes a Dent. If the item takes damage equal to or greater than twice its Hardness in one hit, it takes 2 Dents. For instance, a wooden shield (Hardness 3) that takes 10 damage would take 2 Dents. A typical item can take only 1 Dent without becoming broken. A second Dent causes it to become broken, though it can still be repaired. An item that would take a Dent or become broken while already broken is destroyed beyond salvage. Some magical or especially sturdy items can take more than 1 Dent before becoming broken, as noted in their descriptions.

Note that the behavior of a wooden shield is specifically given as representative of general item behavior.

[Jurassic Pratt]

It's actually completely up in the air exactly how much damage is needed to dent objects as the rule con be interpreted 2 different ways an needs to be clarified. I made a thread about this exact issue

[Nightwhisper]

John Lynch 106 wrote:

I've busted down a few doors in my time. Flimsy locks are definitely easier to break open then deadbolts. Whether it should have THAT much of a difference I don't know. But it should factor in it. Perhaps set the level of the lock+1 level for flimsy wood, +2 level for sturdy wood, +10 level for adamantine?

The playtest core rules also have conradictory DCs in them. Climbing a tree is a level 0 trivial task (DC 5), and yet the DC by level chart gives us DC 9 for a trivial level 0 task.

The table is just really confusing and not explained well.

The level column gives you the level that you use the high DC for that task.
Next are factors that make the difficulty move left or right on the same row.
The Trivial column tells you at what level the activity is trivial, and you can usually skip rolling if not in a life-or-death situation.

Really, they shouldn't have used trivial here, since it is also the name of a difficulty.

[ChibiNyan]

I believe Mark Seifter confirmed that you only need 11 damage to dent a door, no damage is being substracted when you attack objects. So I guess it is reasonably easy to smash anything, which is nice, maybe the easiest thing to achieve in the Playtest.

[DerNils]

Now that the sentence "Items reduce damge by hardness" is gone, it is at last clear how much damage we Need. Remains to be seen how apply that damage, if a door can be flatfooted, and what is the AC to be beaten.
Referring that RAW, there is no Action to attack an item, items are vulnerable to precision damage and critical hits - all things needed to make sure your rapierwielding rogue will have an easier time killing that door than picking the lock ;)