What are some good examples of knowledge dc's in various published sources? Particularly dc's of 20+.
I want to play a character with good ranks in knowledge in all Knowledge Skills, would there be a better way than Bardic Knowledge? A Sherlock Holmes/Dr Who kind of character.
Knowledge Local; how do you describe it? Say for a Jade Regeant kind of game, traveling to a distant place you have never been to.
Think of Knowledge (local) as an anthropological Knowledge skill. You learn about humanoids, and in the case of those races you are familiar with you can understand their cultural and societal practices and mannerisms. You also become skilled at identifying these things in new cultures you encounter, though factors of a new culture that differ from those you are familiar with should be manifested as penalties to your skill checks.
The DCs for Knowledge checks are going to vary based on many different factors. What are you trying to identify or learn? How familiar is the individual character with this type of information? Is the topic common in the region or secretive? Has information on the subject been gathered before hand?
Ultimately, the DC of Knowledge skills is largely left up to the GM to determine and there is really no defined scale or range that can be defined. The best advice I can offer is to discuss this with your GM, instead of the general community here.
Monster knowledge checks are typically 10+CR, so anything over CR 10 is probably going to need to beat a DC 20. Every 5 points past the DC gives you another bit of information, so knowledge skill bonuses are still useful even if you can auto-succeed on the base check.
Wizards make good loremasters, since they have all knowledge skills as class skills and are intelligence based (meaning they will probably have the skill points needed to max all the knowledge skills).
To toot my own horn a little, I recommend my Pathfinder re-write of the Archivist, especially if you'd like a divine caster.
Also, be an elf over 100 and take breadth of experience.
Regarding knowledge (local), it's basically the knowledge (nature) for humanoids. Just as arcana covers dragons, constructs and magical rituals, and religion covers myths, gods and undead, and nature covers plants, animals and weather - things that would really be very different schools of study, knowledge (local) has a wide breadth of coverage.
Actually, if you look closely at the rules in the book about knowledge skills, anyone can make any knowledge check. It may be at a negative, but you don't have to be skilled in it to use it. ... If you have a library at your disposal it will take more time, but you can find the answer.
A quick note, if the Knowledge check in question is more than DC 10, you must have a library, otherwise you cannot roll untrained.
A quick note, if the Knowledge check in question is more than DC 10, you must have a library, otherwise you cannot roll untrained.
This is true, and spelled out in black and Parchment. Still the GM always has the last say in how rules are used (no one is arguing, just giving info).
My group has one house rule that specifically hits on this subject (yes a house rule, not a book rule) which states anyone can make any knowledge check of any DC. They suffer a negative modifier if it is not a trained check. The reason they can make this check is because of varied knowledge. He heard this, she heard that, mommy used to read stories about the other...you get the idea. If they fail the roll then they have no info on it and cannot make another check.
We have same house rule but pretty much need to roll a Nat 20 to know anything useful without it being trained or unless the information is very common.
We have a lot of people who take 1 point in various knowledges. :)
What are some good examples of knowledge dc's in various published sources? Particularly dc's of 20+.
I want to play a character with good ranks in knowledge in all Knowledge Skills, would there be a better way than Bardic Knowledge? A Sherlock Holmes/Dr Who kind of character.
Knowledge Local; how do you describe it? Say for a Jade Regeant kind of game, traveling to a distant place you have never been to.
There are some examples of Research checks in the first book of the Carrion Crown AP. They include a few DCs of 20+. For focused characters with some resources (Libraries, for example).
The same book also serves as an example of how to work the bonus for a library into the adventure.
Thanks for the replies.
Ultimately, the DC of Knowledge skills is largely left up to the GM to determine and there is really no defined scale or range that can be defined. The best advice I can offer is to discuss this with your GM, instead of the general community here.
It's MY character/concept and MY opinon on how knowledge skills should work, which may, nay will probably be different than the DMs. I want to have independent thoughts on the subject so I can see around any bias I might have.
Good loremaster characters besides the obvious bards are Mindchemist alchemists or Oracles of Lore.
I had looked at Oracles of Lore, but not Mindchemist. Hmm, interesting. Certainly the Loracles final revalation is big, but how about an Oracle of Time. "Think On It" is 1/day at +10, while "Knowledge of the Ages" is based on chr but can be used more times per day at a smaller bonus. Mindchemist works right into my concept. +20 on all knowledge skill rolls at level 4, though I would give up bard caster levels for this.
Mauril;
Breadth of Experience, nice.
Bigger Club;
it's PF, but for 3.5 Psion would be good. I just never got too far into the psionics rules.
Urath DM;
The Carrion Crown stuff was the kind of stuff I was looking for, thanks.
It's MY character/concept and MY opinon on how knowledge skills should work, which may, nay will probably be different than the DMs. I want to have independent thoughts on the subject so I can see around any bias I might have.
I understand what you're saying, but my advice to speak to your GM was, in part, because the use of the Knowledge skill can be controversial. In the past I've invested skill points in a Knowledge-based character, only to have the GM tell me that he doesn't use the skill. In another instance I was told that Knowledge would be used for identifying creatures, and nothing else. In a third instance, I faced a situation where my GM informed me that our group was facing threats no other humanoids had encountered before; apparently he determined there was no way for my character to know anything about what we faced and he imposed a blanket +20 to every DC as a result, rendering my Knowledge skills useless.
I usually run characters with at least one or two areas of Knowledge-based expertise. In my entire gaming career, I'd say a little under half of the GMs I've played with even attempted to use the skill in a way that was similar to how it was described int the rules; there are many GMs that either don't care to bother with the Knowledge skill, or dislike it outright. You need to make sure yours is not one of these, because if he or she is there's nothing you can do about it. Your opinion on the subject won't matter.