is it allowed to take 20 on sleight of hand checks to hide items on your person?
i am of the opinion that you can. after each attempt, you could then yourself (or an ally) take 20 on a perception check to notice them, if they do, you just try again, over and over until you get them as difficult to spot as possible. this would technically take longer, but i'm just using it as an example as to how it is possible to do with no real penalty for failure.
and in the same vein i think it would be possible to take 20 on a stealth check to wait in ambush for someone for the same reasons as above (assuming you would have ample time to hide yourself, and knew when and where your target was coming)
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Yeah, I don't think it's necessarily overpowered that if you have nearly an hour's prep time that you can hide a small item on your person to the best of your ability.
For an action that takes a single round, 'Taking 400' (as it were) is the equivalent of 40 minutes of preparation. If you have multiple people taking 20 to set an ambush and someone searching individually for each of them, we're getting into days worth of preparation.
why couldn't an npc/victim take 20 also? they would just get ambushed.
honestly just rolling normally and taking 20 on your own perception check is perfectly legitimate by the rules to try and make sure you did a good job. if your own perception is about as good as your own stealth/sleight of hand, you can't argue against trying over and over until you can't find it, or it was very hard for you to find (in the case of your perception being better than your stealth/sleight of hand)
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No, you cannot take 20 when trying to hide an item on your person because the opposed rolls are made when you are frisked or searched. If your GM wants to give you a bonus to your roll for taking so long to conceal your weapon I could get behind it, but as for the actual skill check, that is made when you are searched and you're allowed one roll.
Likewise with your stealth check. If you want to "prep" then the GM may give you a bonus to your roll, but you aren't hiding over and over and over again until you aren't seen. When your prey enters the area the two of you make opposed rolls and the outcome is determined. You don't get to make roll after roll after roll.
No, you cannot take 20 when trying to hide an item on your person because the opposed rolls are made when you are frisked or searched. If your GM wants to give you a bonus to your roll for taking so long to conceal your weapon I could get behind it, but as for the actual skill check, that is made when you are searched and you're allowed one roll.
Likewise with your stealth check. If you want to "prep" then the GM may give you a bonus to your roll, but you aren't hiding over and over and over again until you aren't seen. When your prey enters the area the two of you make opposed rolls and the outcome is determined. You don't get to make roll after roll after roll.
why can't i may roll after roll after roll? i can take 20 on perception checks. if that bothers you so much, i have an ally that takes 20 on perception checks. perception checks are clearly stated in the rules as an example of taking 20.
so i make 1 roll to use sleight of hand to hide a dagger on myself. i ask my ally to search me to see if he can find it. he takes 20 on a perception check on me. if he finds it, i try my sleight of hand check again. if he can't find it, then i hide it on myself well enough. at the very least i can guarantee my sleight of hand check to hide it will be good, if not a 20, based on whoever's perception i'm using to test it.
the same would apply to stealth.
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When you have plenty of time, you are faced with no threats or distractions, and the skill being attempted carries no penalties for failure you can take 20.
That's why. Yes, perception checks are clearly stated in the rules for taking 20, when attempting to find traps. You don't get to take 20 when you're trying to listen to a conversation through a door or when you enter a room to see a hidden npc.
As has been stated above, you don't get to take 20 on opposed checks between characters. Before you ask, no it does not say that anywhere in the rules, but what is good for the goose is good for the gander. If you start taking 20 on opposed rolls so will the NPCs. As a PC you don't want that. There are a lot more enemies out there with a lot more bonuses to their skills than you have and taking 20 all the time will invariably lead to you never succeeding on a skill check ever again.
taking 20 on a perception check to find my hidden dagger is why i was making that point, not a generic taking 20. the fact remains that if i can have someone with a very high perception take 20 on searching someone, which is entirely within the rules, then they can tell me about how hard it was each time to find the dagger on me. doing this over and over would in the end result in me having the dagger hidden in the best possible way. the only difference between doing this and taking 20, is a whole bunch of dice rolls until i get a 20, which the take 20 rule was made simply to save time and avoid having to do this.
and taking 20 takes 20 times longer than normal. if npcs have time to do so, why shouldnt they?
no you don't get to take 20 on a roll to overhear a conversation through a door, because you don't have 20 opportunities to do so. and you CAN take 20 on a perception to see that hidden enemy, if that hidden enemy is dumb enough to stay there for 20 rounds from when you first start, because your first start should be the 'rolling a 1' scenario. if the enemy stays there for 20 rounds, you would find him. it would be no different than a game of hide-and-go-seek, search long enough and you would find him.
No, you cannot take 20 when trying to hide an item on your person because the opposed rolls are made when you are frisked or searched.
While I guess that might be true I guess, that's not the situation here.
1) I hide something
2) Party member takes 20 on frisking me, aka I roll my Sleight of Hand now
3) If he finds it, I try to hide it again, go back to 1)
4) If he doesn't find it, I leave it at that.
In some situations it makes just so much more sense to interpret "take 20" as "makes a single attempt and triple- and quadruple-checks every step to make sure it's right" vs "just tries 20 times"
Sleight of Hand is one of those in my opinion. When I only have 6 seconds to quickly hide the bag of cocaine then the cop is probably going to find it. If I have 2 minutes to hide it, they might need a full cavity search or x-ray. It's not like I try 20 times to hide it, I hide it once but make sure its done right.
(yes that's not the rules, but makes so much more sense to describe it)