Skills reaching "No need to Roll" levels

[Gwiber]

How do you handle skills when the ranks and total skill values being to reach a level where rolling becomes more or less pointless?

I have a Bard for instance only 9th level who by various means has a Sing skill that is close to 20 without a die roll. Since 's are not auto fails in skill rolls. he almost always gets a minimum of 20 or 21 (I'd have to check the sheet to be sure) and the Performance skill mentions 25 is the kind of level of roll that God's listen too.

Except for using this roll for certain save functions in a bardic performance, virtually any roll I make for regular Sing is going to make god's turn and looks at me.

In a game I run, the current average PC level is 12, and those PC's have a handful of skills each that blow over 20 in total. Even in a stressful situation its not uncommon to see a 1 rolled, and still get mid-20's on the roll result.

At what point do you as a DM have to throw your hands up at some skill totals and just skip rolling and "give" the players whatever it is they wanna roll for?

We're getting to the point where the DM for the game my Bard is in, is having to make outrageous difficulties to challenge my Bard's knowledge of things, like asking for 40's, which is entirely out of the range of almost all skill difficulties (for unchallenged rolls); and he is doing it "on the fly" without thinking about what he is doing.

How do you guys handle this kind of issue? Or how would you see handling it?

I'm no sure if the book states it or not. But when it comes to knowledge of things; we usually state 15 gets you the base knowledge (A monsters name for instance), and for every 5 points or part of greater, you get another piece of knowledge (Like knowing a single category on a monsters stat block). This is getting frustrating to my Dm with my Bard because unless the DM creates a a monster whole cloth and has it be unique, my Bard generally points at it and goes "I know what that is. here;s how to bet it!"

[Duiker]

Well first of all, the knowledge DR is too low. It's supposed to be 10+CR as a rule of thumb or 15+CR if it's totally rare (I think, I know the first one is right, the second one is slightly hazy). So at level 12, you should be running into bosses a few CR above you, which is more like DC 25 or 30 just to know the thing's name, not DC 15.

Second of all, on the more general point, roll with it so to speak. Go into loving detail about how they succeed on these things. Tell the bard how he has actually read the Collected Studies of Lich Research by Edmund the VII, a thousand year old tome that details all of this info.

Start looking for ways to give additional difficult options. Performing is at +25? Sure, you can not even roll to get free drinks at every tavern, but have you tried singing a song so beautiful that a battalion of orcs stops what they're doing and starts sobbing? Or sang such a rousing song of courage that the townsfolk clamor out of their village and hit the enemy from behind?

The problem is that at high levels your skills give you superhuman abilities for all intents and purposes, but you're still testing the players against the mundane. Don't take the mundane successes away from them, but make it clear that skills that high open up new options DC40, DC50 things that aren't even considered at lower levels.

[Doombringer the DM]

In higher level games I give realistically higher scaling DCs... for example by fusing worlds. Take content that is from completely different systems... and let the DC be scaled to something much higher than it would be, seeing as realistically, your bard should never have seen or heard of these things.

There are no illithids in Golarion for example... but your bard may have heard of an EXTREMELY obscure tale in which one somehow found it's way into Golarion.

Outsiders from different universes.

Cthulhu.

Modern technology.

[Haskol]

I'd scrap the 'standard' DCs for skills for either scaled DCs based on character level or do away with DCs altogether and base success or failure based on the result of the roll and the situation at hand.

If someone rolls a 30 on say Diplomacy on average and it talking with a nobody commoner, then yeah, they will almost always get their way. But maybe you think 30 is not enough to Diplo the BBEG or ally of said BBEG. The DCs will never be set in stone which can be problematic but it gives you a lot more flexibility.

[Bandw2]

yeah, if you want to do something, make them go to some place they have literally no ability to have known anything about and thus all the skill checks get bumped as their character has to infer knowledge rather than read it.

mind you keep normal stuff around and keep giving them normal things they can "roll" against, so they still feel super extra worth all those feats/etc to get that high, but allow them to do super things as well basically.

[Zhayne]

If the PC is incapable of failing the skill roll, and the result is simply binary, then they succeed.

[BretI]

Change the question.

If the character has that good a skill, what other skills have they neglected?

Really, in the case of the Bard why continue putting points into Sing? Aren't there other skills that would be useful?

[blackbloodtroll]

Just purposefully fail a few.

It's what your DM wants.

It doesn't matter how much you invested, your DM just wants to prove something to you, and himself, and get you with a "gotcha" moment.

If he asked why you purposefully failed, just tell him:

"Well, it was obvious that is all you wanted. You have proved that I can fail, if you wish it so. I hope we can move on, and maybe let my be good at the things I invested in being good at."

[Petty Alchemy]

BretI wrote:

Change the question.

If the character has that good a skill, what other skills have they neglected?

Really, in the case of the Bard why continue putting points into Sing? Aren't there other skills that would be useful?

Precisely, there's diminishing returns for over-optimizing a skill. You could be spending those resources elsewhere.

[Claxon]

The DM arbitrarily raising the DC for skills is bull. Else, what is the point of focusing skill points into a skill. You're doing it to be good at something and not fail common tasks and actions. That's the point.

So what does a GM do when the DC of something is out scaled by a PC static ability? Congratulate the PC on being a master of that skill and focusing on it.

Is it really a problem that they succeed? Why don't you want them to succeed? There's no good answer to this and short of maybe some very specific instances the point of focusing to be good in a skill is to get to a point where success is virtually automatic.

[Cevah]

Knowledge Skill

Quote:

You can use this skill to identify monsters and their special powers or vulnerabilities. In general, the DC of such a check equals 10 + the monster’s CR. For common monsters, such as goblins, the DC of this check equals 5 + the monster’s CR. For particularly rare monsters, such as the tarrasque, the DC of this check equals 15 + the monster’s CR or more. A successful check allows you to remember a bit of useful information about that monster. For every 5 points by which your check result exceeds the DC, you recall another piece of useful information.

You only got 20 at level 9?

My ninja at level 10 has:
Acrobatics 23, +5 on jumps
Bluff 23
Diplomacy 26, +2 if they like Pirates
Disguise 27
Stealth 22 [yeah, I'm slacking here]
Use Magic Device 24
Poor Perception is only 17, +2 if my familiar is close
and I did not spend any feats on skills. [Magic, however....]

I also like using Take-10 when I can.

Knowledge caps:
DC .. Knowledge Skill .. Task
25 + spell level .. Arcana .. Identify a spell that just targeted you
15 + hazard's CR .. Dungeoneering .. Identify underground hazard
20 .. Engineering .. Determine a structure's weakness
20 .. Geography .. Know location of nearest community or noteworthy site
20 .. History .. Know obscure or ancient historical event
20 .. Local .. Know hidden organizations, rulers, and locations
15 + hazard's CR .. Nature .. Identify natural hazard
20 .. Nobility .. Know line of succession
20 .. Planes .. Identify a creature's planar origin
20 .. Religion .. Recognize an obscure deity's symbol or clergy
15 + CR .. Varies .. Identify a monster's abilities and weaknesses

I think Ultimate Campaign has some DC 30 entries. I think creating an artistic masterpiece requires a DC 30 (craft/profession).

Remember, you cannot retry or use untrained without something overriding standard skill usage.

As a bard, you get (1st) Bardic Knowledge, which increases your knowledge roll. You get (2nd) Versatile Performance, which can boost skills. You get (5th) Lore Master, which lets you pull a 20 on your knowledge roll.

Why get more than X+CR or C+SL? Often, you get scaling benefits by how much you beat the DC. Like 1 tidbit per 5 you beat the DC to ID a monster. These can also be extra rumors for gather information, convincing others that the other guy is the imposter with bluff or even that you are a demon with disguise even though you do things a demon would not do. Remember, there are penalties that can be applied that cause the DC to go up.

/cevah

[Bandw2]

Claxon wrote:

The DM arbitrarily raising the DC for skills is bull. Else, what is the point of focusing skill points into a skill. You're doing it to be good at something and not fail common tasks and actions. That's the point.

to still give them the challenge, obviously rewards should shift up accordingly for success as well, but most rolls should still just be auto wins.

[Claxon]

Bandw2 wrote:

Claxon wrote:

The DM arbitrarily raising the DC for skills is bull. Else, what is the point of focusing skill points into a skill. You're doing it to be good at something and not fail common tasks and actions. That's the point.

to still give them the challenge, obviously rewards should shift up accordingly for success as well, but most rolls should still just be auto wins.

Is it actually fun to do that?

As a player, that answer for me is a clear no. Otherwise you are negating the point of my choices. Short of a few specific skills and how they are used I don't feel this is a problem. The skills which it is a problem are Bluff, Diplomacy, and Intimidate and those problems are because of how those skills specifically work not because DCs aren't necessarily high enough, but the power they have.

Skills like Stealth and Perception are opposed and can remain challenging based on your opponent. Skills like acrobatics for jumping shouldn't necessarily remain relevant because why should a jump of the same distance suddenly be impossible.

I get the idea of challenges, but after 10 levels skills shouldn't really be what you're challenged on.

[Emmanuel Nouvellon-Pugh]

Duiker wrote:

Well first of all, the knowledge DR is too low. It's supposed to be 10+CR as a rule of thumb or 15+CR if it's totally rare (I think, I know the first one is right, the second one is slightly hazy). So at level 12, you should be running into bosses a few CR above you, which is more like DC 25 or 30 just to know the thing's name, not DC 15.

Second of all, on the more general point, roll with it so to speak. Go into loving detail about how they succeed on these things. Tell the bard how he has actually read the Collected Studies of Lich Research by Edmund the VII, a thousand year old tome that details all of this info.

Start looking for ways to give additional difficult options. Performing is at +25? Sure, you can not even roll to get free drinks at every tavern, but have you tried singing a song so beautiful that a battalion of orcs stops what they're doing and starts sobbing? Or sang such a rousing song of courage that the townsfolk clamor out of their village and hit the enemy from behind?

The problem is that at high levels your skills give you superhuman abilities for all intents and purposes, but you're still testing the players against the mundane. Don't take the mundane successes away from them, but make it clear that skills that high open up new options DC40, DC50 things that aren't even considered at lower levels.

I agree with this guy in that the DC's should account for high level play. Max ranks in a class skill at level 12 with a 20 in that ability is a +20 right off the bat, skill focus makes it +26, and if they have a class ability associated with it then fuhghet about it. I would rather reward that instead of "fixing" it. Gotcha DM'ing is how you know you're dealing with a child, but be mature enough to indulge their momentary delight even if your character dies, for there is another to take his place that's even worse than the last (Muah hah hah ha ha).

[Bandw2]

Claxon wrote:

Bandw2 wrote:

Claxon wrote:

The DM arbitrarily raising the DC for skills is bull. Else, what is the point of focusing skill points into a skill. You're doing it to be good at something and not fail common tasks and actions. That's the point.

to still give them the challenge, obviously rewards should shift up accordingly for success as well, but most rolls should still just be auto wins.

Is it actually fun to do that?

As a player, that answer for me is a clear no. Otherwise you are negating the point of my choices. Short of a few specific skills and how they are used I don't feel this is a problem. The skills which it is a problem are Bluff, Diplomacy, and Intimidate and those problems are because of how those skills specifically work not because DCs aren't necessarily high enough, but the power they have.

Skills like Stealth and Perception are opposed and can remain challenging based on your opponent. Skills like acrobatics for jumping shouldn't necessarily remain relevant because why should a jump of the same distance suddenly be impossible.

I get the idea of challenges, but after 10 levels skills shouldn't really be what you're challenged on.

the the point of you playing pathfinder is not to in fact play pathfinder?(this feels overly combative) you chose to emphasize a skill, so i made a challenge and reward worth of that focus. i don't see the problem here. I'm not making it a problem, i'm working with the player to make his choice not invalidate the challenge the game can poze on a player. as mentioned most rolls should still auto win. but when he manages to jam a draw bridge/portcullis with out access to the machinery or ropes with a huge DC disable device check and thus keeps the gate open, that's a huge boon to the party because he focuses on disable device.

[Anonymous Visitor 163 576]

So, let me see if I understand...

If a character can auto-succeed on a DC 25 climb check, that's bs, but if they can cast levitate, then that's normal?

Sound's like you're discriminating against non-casters. Shouldn't 10th level characters be cool? Like, James Bond cool?

[Bandw2]

Anonymous Visitor 163 576 wrote:

So, let me see if I understand...

If a character can auto-succeed on a DC 25 climb check, that's bs, but if they can cast levitate, then that's normal?

Sound's like you're discriminating against non-casters. Shouldn't 10th level characters be cool? Like, James Bond cool?

i'm saying, that if there's a DC 25 climb check, he auto passes it, but now he can grab people who might fall, and rush up the wall. or who knows, it might be raining. so all the torches are out making the stealth climb up the cliff side extra sneaky but harder.

[blahpers]

Gwiber wrote:

How do you handle skills when the ranks and total skill values being to reach a level where rolling becomes more or less pointless?

They roll (or take 10). If they succeed, they succeed. If they literally can't fail, make them roll (or take 10) anyway; keeps them on their toes. They invested a lot in those skills to be that good at them when they could have invested those ranks/traits/feats/class features on other things. Validate their investment.

If you can find challenges worthy of their abilities, so much the better. But whatever you do, don't take normal challenges and artificially inflate their difficulty just to keep things interesting. The lock on Bob the Fletcher's hut isn't going to suddenly be a masterwork adamantine lock with compass in the stock just because Al the Arcane Trickster wanders into town with a +40 Disable Device modifier. That's just another way to invalidate their investment--they could have simply not spent those ranks and the lock would have been simpler.

Instead, make sure they have the occasional opportunity to bypass ridiculous compound deathtraps or break into Abadar's Own Money Bin--challenges that no mere sneakthief could hope to overcome.

[Create Mr. Pitt]

I think everyone has really come together on this. Some checks are opposed. Some have built in rules, like knowledge checks to ID creatures and crafting. The remainder shouldn't be artificially limited, but they can be handwaived at a certain point. For instance, I will often give my very knowledgeable players additional knowledge without checks when those checks would automatically succeed, but I give them opportunity to take knowledge checks and gain really obscure or esoteric knowledge. At high levels I like to use skills to give players the opportunity to feel truly heroic even at mundane tasks. Instead of simply artificially raising DCs to keep things random, give people an opportunity to do the extraordinary.

[Ashiel]

Blaphers wrote:

But whatever you do, don't take normal challenges and artificially inflate their difficulty just to keep things interesting. The lock on Bob the Fletcher's hut isn't going to suddenly be a masterwork adamantine lock with compass in the stock just because Al the Arcane Trickster wanders into town with a +40 Disable Device modifier. That's just another way to invalidate their investment--they could have simply not spent those ranks and the lock would have been simpler.

PREACH IT!!! (Q_Q)

[Mysterious Stranger]

Keep in mind at 9th level he is supposed to be one of the most powerful individuals in the kingdom. The vast majority of people are supposed to be 6th level or lower. There are supposed to be handful of level 7th to 12th in each kingdom. Characters over 12 level are the most powerful in the entire world.

While individual campaigns may vary this is the baseline assumption. Player characters are supposed to be special and be able to do things other cant. Also keep in mind that circumstance bonus or penalties are cumulative and stack. With the bard I don’t think having a +26 sing is the problem, what is probably the issue is versatile performance.

Another thing is most skills that the character max out tend to be skills that can be opposed. Sure with a +26 bluff it seems like you can lie to anyone, but keep in mind that there will be people and creatures the player interact with that have equally high skills. A quick check on CR 9 creatures showed that most of them have perception and sense motive skills ranging from +3 to +23.

[Bandw2]

Ashiel wrote:

Blaphers wrote:

But whatever you do, don't take normal challenges and artificially inflate their difficulty just to keep things interesting. The lock on Bob the Fletcher's hut isn't going to suddenly be a masterwork adamantine lock with compass in the stock just because Al the Arcane Trickster wanders into town with a +40 Disable Device modifier. That's just another way to invalidate their investment--they could have simply not spent those ranks and the lock would have been simpler.

PREACH IT!!! (Q_Q)

bob the fletcher, is actually the disowned son of a nobleman, his mother keeps sending him money, and the local thieves guild have found out, the money that he's managed to keep, he's used to keep the damned thieves out.

unfortunately, all this has done is caused the thieves guild to up their game. Bob has put out a bounty on anyone who can handle the thieves guild. upon the party making it to the thieves guild, their given a choice to instead help them get into bob the fletcher's secret money stash hidden in his 10x10 hut covered in adamantine and filled with death traps.

this is the party's journey.

[Gwiber]

Be a bit disingenuous of everything the PC's crossed was "Bob the Fletcher" in your described situation, just to challenge the PC's.

Not every NPC you cross is going to have that kind of backstory.

And barring opposed checks, my main concern was indeed running up on having skills at base so high, that the Difficulties are easy to hit or exceed with every single roll. That my current Dm is artificially inflating the Diff's, just to do so because he sees high numbers and thinks he need to put high numbers out there.

As for my Bard being focused om Sing, he is. for now, in time, I will expand. His being focused on Sing as the way he put his points wasn't the point of the question at hand.

[pauljathome]

The skill system in pathfinder is pretty fundamentally broken at high levels. Different skills scale very differently so a "20" is very high for some skills and barely adequate for others.

RAW all of the social skills can pretty much break the game.

Most groups end up implementing some house rules, either explicitly or implicitly by arbitrarily changing difficulties (like your GM seems to be doing).

The best solution is to discuss it as a group and decide what game you want to play. Some groups want to absolutely trounce mundane obstacles, some groups want a consistent level of challenge (is, you always have to come up with a decent description and roll at least reasonably) some groups are somewhere in between.

[Bandw2]

Gwiber wrote:

Be a bit disingenuous of everything the PC's crossed was "Bob the Fletcher" in your described situation, just to challenge the PC's.

Not every NPC you cross is going to have that kind of backstory.

And barring opposed checks, my main concern was indeed running up on having skills at base so high, that the Difficulties are easy to hit or exceed with every single roll. That my current Dm is artificially inflating the Diff's, just to do so because he sees high numbers and thinks he need to put high numbers out there.

As for my Bard being focused om Sing, he is. for now, in time, I will expand. His being focused on Sing as the way he put his points wasn't the point of the question at hand.

you misunderstood, that was the whole campaign.

[ZanThrax]

Haskol wrote:

I'd scrap the 'standard' DCs for skills for either scaled DCs based on character level or do away with DCs altogether and base success or failure based on the result of the roll and the situation at hand.

The moment that you do that, you make actual skill rank completely irrelevant. If I go out of my way to make a highly skilled character, and then find out that the DC for something the GM thinks should be "hard" is set as "my total skill bonus" +18, no matter what, then I'm going to stop making skillful characters and go with classes that grant only 2 skill points, dump Int, never even consider spending an FCB on a skill point or taking any feats that boost skills, because all that actually matters is getting lucky on the dice roll.

[wraithstrike]

I don't do anything. If the players works that hard to be good at something he should reap the rewards.

[Chess Pwn]

This is penalizing the player in my opinion and invalidating their choice.
"Okay I want their best person to have a 50% chance of failing, so at lv1 it's okay, everyone's skills are pretty close to the others."
Then
"Lv10 now, 1 person has a skill maxed and the others still have only 1 point in it, well now to keep the best at a 50% the others are impossible to use the skill. Good job skill guy, making it harder for the team"
OR
"Lv 10, okay, no one put any points into this, but I don't want them to auto fail so I'll put it at 50% chance for the best."

Either way it makes a 4 int character seem mighty tempting to me. "You mean it doesn't matter how many skills I have, I'll either pass or fail based on if the GM wants me to or not, regardless of my skills? He'll just make it harder if I put skills in, or easier if I don't? Sounds great!"

Skills are part of the class' power budget, if you negate those then those classes are worse off, they can't combat as well as a martial. Martials are gods of battle, spellcasters are gods of everything, and what does the rogue have? I can maybe be a skills god.

So unless you're also raising the AC of creatures more than the CR says to if your martial has a higher hit chance, Or the spell resistance if the spell caster takes spell pen, or the creatures saves if the caster takes spell focus, you shouldn't be messing with skill DC's. Yes, Gods like to listen whenever the bard sings, cool. Use that in the story if you want. The dark god of the abyss wants him to sing his praises all day. Otherwise, what does it matter? If the Gods aren't doing anything who cares if they're listening in.

[Chess Pwn]

Look GM I made a fire blaster sorcerer. GM says, okay, I'll add fire resist 5 or more to everything now. player, I just picked up maximize! GM guess I'll increase the fire resist. player, man everything resists fire, I'll pick the elemental metamagic to get around that. GM, Now everything resists fire and the other element he picked.

This would stop the spellcaster from doing insta-kills. Oh that mob of goblins, against a lv10 spellcaster, well I'll raise something(resist, saves, SR), don't want this being to easy for them.

[Rynjin]

Gwiber wrote:

How do you guys handle this kind of issue?

Pat my player on the back for being good at a thing, and move on with the game.

Gwiber wrote:

I'm no sure if the book states it or not. But when it comes to knowledge of things; we usually state 15 gets you the base knowledge (A monsters name for instance), and for every 5 points or part of greater, you get another piece of knowledge (Like knowing a single category on a monsters stat block). This is getting frustrating to my Dm with my Bard because unless the DM creates a a monster whole cloth and has it be unique, my Bard generally points at it and goes "I know what that is. here;s how to bet it!"

As stated before, you're lowballing DCs there as per RAW. It's 10+CR for one piece of info, and another piece for every 5 you exceed that.

Chess Pwn wrote:

Look GM I made a fire blaster sorcerer. GM says, okay, I'll add fire resist 5 or more to everything now. player, I just picked up maximize! GM guess I'll increase the fire resist. player, man everything resists fire, I'll pick the elemental metamagic to get around that. GM, Now everything resists fire and the other element he picked.

This would stop the spellcaster from doing insta-kills. Oh that mob of goblins, against a lv10 spellcaster, well I'll raise something(resist, saves, SR), don't want this being to easy for them.

Quality GMing.

Spoiler:

/sarcasm

[TOZ]

Bandw2 wrote:

you misunderstood, that was the whole campaign.

What a boring campaign.

[blahpers]

And the GM-player arms race goes on and on......

WHEN WILL THE CYCLE END? WHEN

[Thymus Vulgaris]

You think your perform skill is obscenely high? Well, keep rocking it, because with versatile performance you might need it if you want to stay ahead of enemy sense motive.
I have a perform sing-focused bard quite a few levels above yours (15 as of two weeks ago), so I don't remember exactly what I may have encountered at your level... but at level 13 with +39 I still managed to fail to bluff a succubus. (Luckily, that didn't come back to bite me). At level 14, I rolled a 1 on my acrobatics to tumble using my +40 perform dance. Too bad the enemy had +47 CMB and I took an AOO. I took one at level 13 as well.

Even if the bard has crazy high perform sing and his bluff follows, what happens when the entire party needs to be convincing? When they've made a deal with a dragon and are trying to get out of it without letting him now that they are cheating him out of quite some costly treasure? Bard succeeds, everyone else fails, you've now made a powerful enemy.

Your perform as straight up perform and not just versatile performance... It'll be uncontested if you keep going. You're almost at the point where the regular perform DCs stop scaling, and in that regard there wouldn't be any reason to invest beyond a +29 where an angel somewhere is moved to tears every time you sing in the shower.
Though seldom used, your countersong can keep your meat shields clear of any enchantment. That is huge, but the new challenge brought on by this now comes in enemies that realise that you are the reason their enchantments aren't working, and if they want to do something about the big brawny guy, their best chance is to take out the flimsy singing dude.

And finally, if your DM is a cool guy, you'll start seeing some reactions to those 30+ perform checks that you dish out. Sure, being a god at bluff and sense motive is one thing, and your allies never need to fear compulsions, but the biggest reward can be to hear, in character, that everyone across the planes know who you are and higher beings are fighting over where your soul goes when you die, and meeting a few of your extraplanar fans. I'm talking from experience :)

Oh, wait, this thread was about more than just perform? Huh. Well, reward them for their investments. Skills like that could make them famous. NPCs can admire them for other things than combat prowess. Challenges can be tailor made to challenge a character's forte, but the high DC should make sense. Don't change it based on the roll, and don't come and tell the knowledge buff that he doesn't know if the Erinyes is immune to fire when he rolled a 32 on his check.

[Bob Bob Bob]

So I'm going to try to avoid edition warring here, but this all comes back to "Page 42" in D&D 4e. It was a list of DCs and damages for actions with no defined rules (swinging on a chandelier, pushing a statue on someone). The problem was that the DCs increased at the same rate as skills increased (all skills increased automatically in 4e), so whatever type of action you needed to roll 10+ on at level 1, you still needed 10+ at level 30. "Easy" tasks never actually become easier as you leveled up, but "hard" tasks didn't actually become any harder either.

Now, there's a lot of arguments as to whether this meant the same task became harder as you leveled up or different tasks simply changed type or the DCs were just for easy/normal/hard things at the level, but the point here is this was a giant argument point for a lot of people because for many people knowing "getting better at a skill" meant not a @#$% thing because you still needed the same rolls is a bad thing. I can't really blame them. Skills lose meaning if growth just means keeping up with expectations and not, you know, getting better.

The game is divided into several distinct power levels (people might disagree where, but usually not that it happens) which causes all kinds of problems, including with skills. By the time you hit the superhero level (15+ at worst, apparently 10+ from some of these) you can roll a 1 and (Sense Motive) get a hunch something is wrong and detect charm/dominate, (Appraise) know the value of any item and if it's magic and which is the most valuable thing in a horde, (Use Magic Device) activate any wand or any item blindly, (Perform) get a patron and become a rock star, (Survival) lead 10 people through the woods with no supplies and track a rat in a house from a 24 hour old trail, (Spellcraft) identify any spell being cast, (Ride) automatically fast mount/dismount a horse bareback, (Linguistics) decipher old/ancient/unknown text, (Handle Animal) everything except raising a wild animal, (Heal) heal people for their level+your wisdom, even without a healer's kit, and (Knowledge) everything except monster IDing and spell IDing. These cap at DC 30 and most are 20 or 25.

And that's fine, because that's what superhuman people should be able to do. If my superpower involves Knowledge (geography), then of course I know everything there is to know about that with no problems whatsoever. If I have to make a roll for it I better be figuring out how to redirect a river to change the local weather patterns (or something else similarly superhuman). If I'm the master of Sense Motive, then yes, I do walk in to a party and go "demon in disguise, cheating on his wife, selling government secrets, normal, charmed by demon, interested in you, interested in me, corrupt, replaced by body double, and this whole party is secretly run by cannibals". That's what "superpower" should mean.

[Bacon666]

With the chars being heroes they need to be better than avg. Joe, but no matter how strong they become, some challenges need to be, well, challenging

Some skills can be performed faster on a high result. (craft...)

Some skills needs to be high to beat opposed rolls (stealth, perception...)

Some skills only gives gm fiat on high rolls (some knowledge...)

I do believe that "high standard" DC's need situational ruling... Singing well enough for the gods to enjoy should be hard fir even highly trained bards... Earning enough fir a meal and a beer should be possible for anyone with just 1 rank...

I use the following DC's:
Easy - 10 - jobs any1 can do, and ppl with just 1 rank almost auto make em...

"trained only" - 20 - jobs untrained ppl needs to be very lucky to pull off...

Expert - 30+ - this job needs a specialist. The + means that the DC can change... I basicly make a lv 6-10 char, maxed the skill, and "let him" take 10 to determine the DC...

When my chars reach high level (13+) I look at 3.5 epic level handbook to get ideas on high skill uses...

The book 101 skill uses (or something like that) also gives many ideas for gm's and players alike...

[Renegadeshepherd]

honestly if a player is so well versed in a skill that I couldn't realistically challenge them without specific and relevant circumstances ill just let em have it. Its obvious that they wanted to be great at it so just let it be.

Now if there is an opposed roll I will up the difficulty somewhat as is befitting the situation. For example, if a BBEG wants to smash in the face of a PC because the PC has storyline item im not going to let the "mouth" with a +50 to diplomacy/bluff talk his way out of it because it was the whole point of the story. But if a PC wants to talk down some thugs then im game. IF that PC "offended" or otherwise made it harder to talk em down then add mods. I seem to recall in the GMs handbook it says something like "problems that cant be solved with violence" and "problems that cant be solved with words" listed as good things in an adventure.

any skill DC that isn't opposed can be abused honestly. Any bard with just one skill point in a knowledge skill and dilettante feat will pass practically any check by taking 10 and of course humans with focused study and skilled make skills too easy.

[Deadalready]

I suggest that you don't worry about it. Players (especially optimisers/min maxers) will eventually hit that ballpark figure where they can roll anything and still succeed, to reach that point usually takes a long time!
Sometimes reaching that point requires diverting points, feats, money or other such things so taking away that triumph (of being good at something) is not nice at all.

Specifically there are a few things you need to remember about skills.

Knowledge checks succeeded just means that players know more about your backstory, history, local legends and other things. Remember bards are the kings of knowledge so early on they will have ridiculous knowledge levels.

I keep knowledge ranks interesting because I go with DC= 10+Monster CR and equaling the DC means I'll tell them the name of the monster and what type/sub type it is. For every 5 points past that, I allow the players to ask for one specific question about the monster (they always ask about it's special abilities) but they can ask about it's exact AC, DR, weakness, etc.

Intimidate checks can only be performed if the character has been involved in 1 minute of conversation.

Diplomacy checks are not mind control, you can not make a person give up their life just to serve you for a moment. It also requires 1 minute of conversation and THE MAX YOU CAN INFLUENCE SOMEONE IS 2 STEPS.

Bluff is opposed by sense motive and isn't enough to break someone's reality. You also need to assign appropriate DCs due to the ridiculousness of the lie.

If players want to keep dumping points into skills let them, it's simply diminishing returns. You'll always have a hard time beating someone at their best skills, instead make them swim across a flowing river or sneak past that guard post or hold onto a barrel to avoid being sucked under water.

[strayshift]

Incredible skill levels can lead to 'epic' situations in adventures, e.g. Indiana Jones running from the giant stone ball and then using his whip to swing across the spiked pit, etc, etc,.

The best way (and it gives the players an incentive to psychologically push boundaries) to deal with this is to roll with it. In a mundane game situation an amazing perform may have an inn full of punters weeping, the bard is always welcome back there and they are remembered as part of local folk-lore. However good luck hiding from that assassins guild, or rebutting the demands of the local lord who wants this amazing performer as part of his court.

In an adventuring situation heroic inspiration can be given or again great feats achieved but use them sparingly and encourage players to add their own twist on the action to make it more 'heroic' and as an expression of their 'character'. They invested in the skills - reward it as part of the colour of your game.

[Wrath]

Opposed skill checks are the ones that scale well.

Knowledge checks also scale well.

Most everything else is static, and that's pretty reasonable I think. A standard cliff doesn't become more difficult to climb because you're level 10.

However, at level ten you may be climbing a sheer cliff with black ice coating it while a storm front moves in. Combining situations can make static DCs change considerably.

Let them have their auto successes. They should be damn awesome. But remember that some situations will pop up that demand more than damn awesome. If you want them to have to roll, the situation needs to epic enough that the players themselves agree a roll makes sense in this case.

[Claxon]

I want to note there is a significant difference between what BandW2 seems to be suggesting (to an extent) and what I was referring to with arbitrarily raising DCs for routine things (i.e. a 5ft long jump is normally a DC 5 Acrobatics, but your GM is a Richard and decides it's a 15).

Providing new opportunities for a PC to use higher levels of skills is different from arbitrarily raising the DC of challenges, though BandW2's suggestions border on this because he appears to arbitrarily change a situation from routine to extraordinary outside of the normal expected scope (at least in his exmaple of Bob the fletcher with the amazing lock, because it feels pretty damned arbitrary to me but since there is an increased reward available for success and assuming not every lock in town will be increased in difficult this can be acceptable).

Rather my problem is when set DCs are ignored and changed because the GM doesn't players to succeed. That's a big damn problem.

[Bandw2]

it was mostly jokes. XD

I'm just saying if the player's need to sneak into a castle and someone is an amazing climber, put that castle on a cliff with no major wall along the cliff face. then also maybe make it slightly obvious that tomorrow it looks like a storm might move in, and thus the player's can wait.

I can't believe someone took my bob the fetcher campaign seriously. Though he does have a dungeon under his hut, that will lead the player's from level 8 to 15 or so. by then most of the thieves guild has perished, but maybe the guild master or one or two memorable peons.

[Deadalready]

My thought at the end of the day:

Players are the heroes of the story, they are supposed to succeed and they're supposed to win. Letting them do that isn't a bad thing.

[Traskus]

Home rule a fumble rule. Roll a natural 1 and something goes wrong with the attempt. Because no matter your skill at something there should always be a chance for failure.

[Bandw2]

could do shadowruns take, than something goes wrong, but you still succeed.

[LeesusFreak]

Traskus wrote:

Home rule a fumble rule. Roll a natural 1 and something goes wrong with the attempt. Because no matter your skill at something there should always be a chance for failure.

Haha, my tables always play with 1's being massive failure. Crit fumble decks make things interesting (that said, it does hurt TWFers and monks much more than anyone else)

[Tormsskull]

+1 for let the PCs be awesome at their skills if they've invested in them. Providing scaling challenges to them is fine as well, as long as it is not arbitrary.

[Lincoln Hills]

Traskus wrote:

...Because no matter your skill at something there should always be a chance for failure.

Remind me to send you a card with this line the next time you're going in for surgery. ;)

The best advice I read on this subject was from Monte Cook in a 'Dungeoncraft[' article years ago:

I. No character is good at every skill, so always build adventures that require more than one skill. If the adventure is "steal the Crown Jewels," you need to make sure there are enough obstacles in place that the bard can't simply offer the Emperor a 'free crown jewel cleaning' and walk out of the castle. (Or at least that the consequences that follow will require solutions other than more Diplomacy rolls.)

II. Sometimes the highly skilled character isn't around, and that's always good for tension or comedy. Don't use it as a trap, and don't do it often, but there's a lot of entertainment at the table from having to watch the barbarian sweat his way through, say, a meeting with the local Mob boss... all the while cursing the fact that the party rogue is on the other side of town, stealing horses, instead of here with his +23 Diplomacy.

I particularly shun the idea of DCs sliding up and down according to character ability: a plausible world (as far as we can ever say that about Pathfinder) shouldn't warp itself to thwart the characters. If local problems no longer challenge them, let 'em go in search of worthy opponents.

[Traskus]

Lincoln Hills wrote:

Traskus wrote:

...Because no matter your skill at something there should always be a chance for failure.

Remind me to send you a card with this line the next time you're going in for surgery. ;)

The best advice I read on this subject was from Monte Cook in a 'Dungeoncraft[' article years ago:

I. No character is good at every skill, so always build adventures that require more than one skill. If the adventure is "steal the Crown Jewels," you need to make sure there are enough obstacles in place that the bard can't simply offer the Emperor a 'free crown jewel cleaning' and walk out of the castle. (Or at least that the consequences that follow will require solutions other than more Diplomacy rolls.)

II. Sometimes the highly skilled character isn't around, and that's always good for tension or comedy. Don't use it as a trap, and don't do it often, but there's a lot of entertainment at the table from having to watch the barbarian sweat his way through, say, a meeting with the local Mob boss... all the while cursing the fact that the party rogue is on the other side of town, stealing horses, instead of here with his +23 Diplomacy.

I particularly shun the idea of DCs sliding up and down according to character ability: a plausible world (as far as we can ever say that about Pathfinder) shouldn't warp itself to thwart the characters. If local problems no longer challenge them, let 'em go in search of worthy opponents.

The sheer number of malpractice suits would tend to indicate that I'm right that there is always a chance for failure.

[pauljathome]

Traskus wrote:

Home rule a fumble rule. Roll a natural 1 and something goes wrong with the attempt. Because no matter your skill at something there should always be a chance for failure.

Many, many, many people loathe auto fail rules. And hate fumble rules even more.

Realistically, people do NOT fail 5% of the time (let alone catastrophically fail) no matter how trivial the task is for them. Do you fail your drive check every 20 trips? Do you fail your profession check once a month?

And cinematically it is worse. Heros don't fail at their specialties unless some circumstance causes them to fail. And the really, really, really good character fails less often than the really good character.

My policy is a combination of
1) let the characters auto succeed a lot when they get good enough
2) let the players know that SOMETIMES circumstances will make things not automatic even at skills where they are very good. Almost always such situations will be obvious ahead of time
3) in a home game, change the rules when they get in the way of the above.
4) try and keep skill difficulties in world more or less consistent as characters level up.

[Tormsskull]

pauljathome wrote:

Many, many, many people loathe auto fail rules. And hate fumble rules even more.

Realistically, people do NOT fail 5% of the time (let alone catastrophically fail) no matter how trivial the task is for them. Do you fail your drive check every 20 trips? Do you fail your profession check once a month?

It could be argued that you're taking a 10 every time you go driving. When the sob to your right tries to speed up and cut you off, you come out of "taking 10 mode", slam on the gas, and take your chances that you can box him out (roll the die.)

I would be fine with a 1 be a catastrophic fail for skills if a 20 is an incredible success. If my PC is crafting a sword and rolls a 20, the sword is so finely crafted it gets a magical ability or some such.

Terrible failure and amazing success can be a lot of fun as long as everyone's on board. Of course, I also really like critical hits and fumbles, so to each their own.