How is Recall Knowledge intended to work?
Say I'm fighting a golem, and want to spend an action to use Recall Knowledge to identify its weaknesses. Does the GM tell me what skill to roll, or do I have to guess, and if I pick the wrong skill I waste my action and learn nothing?
GM: Ha! Your arcana check reveals nothing, because it's not a golem at all, but a knight suffering from giantism.
PC: Well, I guess we learned it's not a golem, and can be killed via conventional means.
GM: You learn nothing!!!
How is Recall Knowledge intended to work?
Say I'm fighting a golem, and want to spend an action to use Recall Knowledge to identify its weaknesses. Does the GM tell me what skill to roll, or do I have to guess, and if I pick the wrong skill I waste my action and learn nothing?
GM: Ha! Your arcana check reveals nothing, because it's not a golem at all, but a knight suffering from giantism.
PC: Well, I guess we learned it's not a golem, and can be killed via conventional means.
GM: You learn nothing!!!
Generally my players get to know the type a creature is without a check, and can then pick an appropriate skill to roll.
Now, if the creature is disguised with illusion magic, or concealing what it is, yeah, then false information might come into play, but I'd certainly let a crit success tell the PCs that something is off/not quite right.
Playing PF1 via MapTool, we have a macro that rolls all knowledge skills for your character; then the GM picks the most relevant one for the situation (if any) and uses that to determine what you know.
Now, that's a free action in PF1, but I think that we will do exactly the same in PF2. After all, the action you spend is to recall what you know about the thing you are looking at, not to guess at what kind of creature it is.
EDIT: yeah, the bag with teeth is right on this.
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I give some applicable skills and what (very general) kind of thing they would be able to learn, ending with "or possibly some other lore if you have one that might apply" in case someone has, say, Sailing Lore and could totally know stories about the sea serpent trying to eat them.
While I like knowledge checks as secret rolls, and the bit of uncertainty that comes from possible critical fails, I don't think that an effort to obscure the applicable skills gives a benefit to the game that's worth the hassle for everyone involved.
Thus is my practice, not a rule, but I think this is one of those things that's left to table practice and only has "advice answers" not "rules answers."
Does the GM tell me what skill to roll, or do I have to guess, and if I pick the wrong skill I waste my action and learn nothing?
That doesn't exist. If you pick the wrong skill you have roughly the same chance to learn something than by picking the good one (at least 55% chance). Just, you'll learn wrong information.
The skill used to identify a creature usually depends on that creature’s trait, as shown on Table 10–7, but you have leeway on which skills apply. For instance, hags are humanoids but have a strong connection to occult spells and live outside society, so you might allow a character to use Occultism to identify them without any DC adjustment, while Society is harder. Lore skills can also be used to identify their specific creature. Using the applicable Lore usually has an easy or very easy DC (before adjusting for rarity).
TABLE 10–7: CREATURE IDENTIFICATION SKILLS gives Aracana for Beast, Construct, and Elemental creatures, Crafting for Construct creatures, Nature for Animal, Beast, Elemental, Fey, Fungus, and Plant creatures, Occultism for Abberation, Astral, Ethereal, Ooze, and Spirit creatures, Religion for Celestial, Fiend, Monitor, and Undead creatures, and Society for Humanoid creatures. Some traits appear on two lists, and we have noticed that trolls have no traits that appear on the table.
Since knowledge rolls in PF2 are secret and rolled by GM, s/he takes whatever you have in the appropriate skill, rolls and tells you what (if anything) do you remember.
I seldom bother with secret rolls, since my players are good at keeping player knowledge from their characters. I treat the trait that gets rolled--Abberation, Animal, Astral, etc.--as basic information that the characters can observe without a Recall Knowledge action.
One day they might encounter a creature in disguise, such as a vampire (Religion category) pretending to be a human (Society category), and I would probably ask them to roll on the trait of the disguise and use the same d20 result myself on a secret check with the real trait.
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The rules of 1E didn't give any say in what you learn about a creature either. It just became common practice to let players pick what they wanted to ask about.
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The rules of 1E didn't give any say in what you learn about a creature either. It just became common practice to let players pick what they wanted to ask about.
True but it was either you know something or you know nothing, not you know alot, you know something, you know nothing, or you know wrong somethings.
Sorry to necro this thread but I am still at a loss with knowledge checks. How are those actually done? Note that is not about the secret check the GM rolls and the possible good or bad results of such a roll, but how to determine if to try this check in the first place.
1) Unknown creature appears.
2) GM provides creature description which may or may not include clues at the nature of said creature.*
3) Player decides that his character is using Recall Knowledge.
4) GM rolls secret check.
5) GM gives feedback to the player according to the check result.
So far, so good.
Who however decides/informs which skill is used and when?
There are at least 6 knowledge skills (arcana, crafting, nature, occultism, religion and society) available and many characters may very well be only trained in one of them. So how are steps 2), 3) and 4) really supposed to work?
Option A) GM provides the creature type along with the creature description. In this case each player can easily decide if to go for the check or not. If they do GM roll check in secret and applies the result. Possible problem: Some meta information has already been handed out to the players.
Option B) GM does not provide the creature type along with the creature description, so each player has to select the skill he wants to use by himself. If the correct skill is used everything is handled as per the recall knowledge rules; if for any reason a wrong skill is used a possible GM answer (after you beat the creature DC with your check) could still be that you are sure that this creature is not something you recognize with the selected skill (e.g. player decides to use religion, but the creature is no undead).
Option C) GM does not provide the creature type along with the creature description and the respective skill and roll are both secret. In that case I would classify the Recall Knowledge action as a waste of breath as chances of actually having the correct skill trained or better might be 1 in 6, dropping success rates for this check into the single digits.
* Ideally the creature description should at least contain hints at the creature type, but this is not universally the case, so I am more interessed in the mechanical way things are supposed to work instead of soft solutions like: Your GM just needs to describe the creature more detailled, so you have an easy time guessing if your character might posses the right skill(s).
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CONCENTRATE SECRET
You attempt a skill check to try to remember a bit of knowledge
regarding a topic related to that skill. The GM determines the
DCs for such checks and which skills apply.
Critical Success You recall the knowledge accurately and gain
additional information or context.
Success You recall the knowledge accurately or gain a useful
clue about your current situation.
Critical Failure You recall incorrect information or gain an
erroneous or misleading clue.
The following skills can be used to Recall Knowledge,
getting information about the listed topics. In some cases,
you can get the GM’s permission to use a different but
related skill, usually against a higher DC than normal. Some
topics might appear on multiple lists, but the skills could
give different information. For example, Arcana might tell
you about the magical defenses of a golem, whereas Crafting
could tell you about its sturdy resistance to physical attacks.
• Arcana: Arcane theories, magical traditions,
creatures of arcane significance, and arcane planes.
• Crafting: Alchemical reactions and creatures, item
value, engineering, unusual materials, and constructs.
• Lore: The subject of the Lore skill’s subcategory.
• Medicine: Diseases, poisons, wounds, and forensics.
• Nature: The environment, flora, geography, weather,
creatures of natural origin, and natural planes.
• Occultism: Ancient mysteries, obscure philosophy,
creatures of occult significance, and esoteric planes.
• Religion: Divine agents, divine planes, theology,
obscure myths, and creatures of religious significance.
• Society: Local history, key personalities, legal
institutions, societal structure, and humanoid culture.
It's a secret roll. The player says they want to recall knowledge. The GM makes a secret roll with the relevant skill. The list of skills tells you what skill to use based on creature type. The GM tells the PC the result. The PC doesn't need to know what skill they used.
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Sorry to necro this thread...
No, it's fine ;-)
Obviously, there's table variation. I give a brief description of the monster's appearance but not the traits. If a player thinks to ask to use Recall Knowledge, I tell them the appropriate skill(s), but not the traits. The player then decides whether or not to roll.
Should they succeed, they get all traits, sans alignment, plus info of GM's choosing (unless they had a specific question). I give out only useful info.
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In theory, I really like the idea of characters asking "what do I know about this creature?" And then the GM consulting the player's sheet to pick the skill that makes the most sense for the creature and then telling them the relevant information, depending on the skill, but I have had a lot of trouble putting that into practice as a GM myself, especially because I am running a survivor horror themed campaign where a lot of the enemies are doppelgängers and pretending to be other things.
1st of all, when it happens out of combat, and every player wants to know what their character knows, and many of them have more than one skill that might apply, I either end up having to roll a ton of dice and remember which ones go to which characters and which skills, or I just roll once and apply their highest bonus. The first option has been slowing down game play, and the second is less fun because it removes the interesting situation where the character gets a higher roll with a lower bonus skill, (especially one that they might have chosen on their own but I'll get to that below) and then end up getting an interesting bit of back story information about the creature tied to their knowledge of nature or religion or lore, rather than just here is this useful bit of mechanical information from the most obvious source of knowledge on your character sheet.
2nd, (and relating to the first) It feels like it removes a lot of agency from the player that can take the story in an interesting direction. For example, why couldn't a character make a religion check against a troll? Sure the DC should be more difficult, but if they roll high enough, it can be a really cool moment in the game when the paladin of Iori recalls a parable of St. Vurdi Almanda who once set his monastery on fire while trapped inside it with a war band of marauding trolls, fighting them off until the flames surrounded them all and then persevering through the trial of flame by climbing out to the roof and jumping 50 ft to the ground below.
(The troll situation is super cliche, but the same situation could be applied to any monster with a specific weakness the players might not know about in a similar fashion).
This kind of spontaneous situation doesn't really come up as often for me when I, as the GM, and having to fumble around reading 4 characters sheets at multiple skills and deciding what I am going to roll, as it does when a player declares something I wouldn't expect and then rolls well on the check.
Originally, I was a big proponent of the secret check for knowledge skills, but often times in practice, it is starting to feel like me as the GM just playing this game with myself, rather than getting to rely on the player ingenuity. Lately, I have been having the players do everything but roll the die, and it has been mostly satisfactory, but my players are really good sports about not getting frustrated when they struggle to pick up any hints from my lackluster description of a creature or monster and thus they end up picking a skill that results in them getting false information.
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You can split the difference: if the player says "I want to Recall Knowledge," then you just roll the relevant skill, but if they specify that they want to Recall Knowledge with X skill, then you decide whether it might be relevant and, if so, what might be revealed. The rules do allow for that kind of skill-shifting:
In some cases, you can get the GM’s permission to use a different but related skill, usually against a higher DC than normal. Some topics might appear on multiple lists, but the skills could give different information. For example, Arcana might tell you about the magical defenses of a golem, whereas Crafting could tell you about its sturdy resistance to physical attacks.
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It's a secret roll. The player says they want to recall knowledge. The GM makes a secret roll with the relevant skill. The list of skills tells you what skill to use based on creature type. The GM tells the PC the result. The PC doesn't need to know what skill they used.
The bolded part is the problematic part as no information is often better the wrong information. And if players do not know that they have at least a chance of succeeding their check (untrained vs trained or better) they will probably never do recall knowledge checks ever again...
2nd, (and relating to the first) It feels like it removes a lot of agency from the player that can take the story in an interesting direction. For example, why couldn't a character make a religion check against a troll? Sure the DC should be more difficult, but if they roll high enough, it can be a really cool moment
Isn't this specifically provided for in the rules above about using alternate skills for identification?
It is.You can allow a knowledge check with any skill you deem appropriate, adjusting the DC or limiting what type of information can be gained as necessary.
So if no one has nature, but someone has Sailing Lore, you can absolutely let that be used for remembering stories about Sea Serpents.
2nd, (and relating to the first) It feels like it removes a lot of agency from the player that can take the story in an interesting direction. For example, why couldn't a character make a religion check against a troll? Sure the DC should be more difficult, but if they roll high enough, it can be a really cool momentIsn't this specifically provided for in the rules above about using alternate skills for identification?
The issue isn't whether such a thing is possible, but how it actually happens in play.
Does the GM role for every possible skill that could apply to see which one is highest? That takes a lot of time for the GM.
If the GM just roles for the most relevant one, then these kind of situations don't come up at all.
It only really happens naturally, at least at my tables, when the players have the freedom to decide for themselves what skill they want to use to make a check.
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It's a secret roll. The player says they want to recall knowledge. The GM makes a secret roll with the relevant skill. The list of skills tells you what skill to use based on creature type. The GM tells the PC the result. The PC doesn't need to know what skill they used.The bolded part is the problematic part as no information is often better the wrong information. And if players do not know that they have at least a chance of succeeding their check (untrained vs trained or better) they will probably never do recall knowledge checks ever again...
I can see that point. This next part is tongue in cheek, but only a little. Everyone takes Untrained Improvisation at 3, or Clever Improviser at either 1 or 5, right? I mean it's just so much better than every other General Feat. I mean there are other good ones, but not that good.
Even just working as I believe it's intended, on the skills listed in the book, it gives the largest single bonus in the game. For all the RAW power gamers out there, it gives you a bonus to any lore skill required, as all lore skills are skills, and it doesn't specifically exclude them. Starting at 7th level, you are effectively trained in all knowledge that exists.
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I feel like telling the players the skill they'd have to roll before they commit to the action isn't that big a deal. The better they are at the skill, the more likely they'd remember seeing the creature before and therefore more likely to spend a couple seconds trying to remember the details.
I can see that point. This next part is tongue in cheek, but only a little. Everyone takes Untrained Improvisation at 3, or Clever Improviser at either 1 or 5, right? I mean it's just so much better than every other General Feat. I mean there are other good ones, but not that good.
Even just working as I believe it's intended, on the skills listed in the book, it gives the largest single bonus in the game. For all the RAW power gamers out there, it gives you a bonus to any lore skill required, as all lore skills are skills, and it doesn't specifically exclude them. Starting at 7th level, you are effectively trained in all knowledge that exists.
I will take CI at level 5 because human and no "better" choices, however even then the difference is still huge. For example at level 7 my INT10 warpriest will test (untrained) arcana at +7 and religion at +15 to +17 (expert or master proficiency and 18 WIS). Thats a full 8 to 10 points better check. Which means that even with this feat I will probably not want to do arcane recall knowledge skill checks ever.
The DC for a common level 7 monster is 23 by the way. So even with this feat an arcana check would require a 16+ (5% crit success, 20% success, 50% failure and 25% crit failure) while using religion this is at least an 8+ only (15% crit success, 50% success, 30 failure, 5% crit fail). Add a uncommon or higher level monster to the mix and chances to succeed with arcana will be reduced to a natural 20 with a very high chance to crit fail your check.
I can see that point. This next part is tongue in cheek, but only a little. Everyone takes Untrained Improvisation at 3, or Clever Improviser at either 1 or 5, right? I mean it's just so much better than every other General Feat. I mean there are other good ones, but not that good.
Even just working as I believe it's intended, on the skills listed in the book, it gives the largest single bonus in the game. For all the RAW power gamers out there, it gives you a bonus to any lore skill required, as all lore skills are skills, and it doesn't specifically exclude them. Starting at 7th level, you are effectively trained in all knowledge that exists.
I don't really see it. Like, getting a +7 (or whatever) bonus looks good on paper but it really only takes you from "always fails at this, no question" to "Probably not going to succeed at many checks". You're at least 6 points behind someone at your level who's good at the skill, which is a lot.
Not saying Untrained Improv is trash, depending on the campaign it can be pretty useful and it can allow you to attempt certain strategies you normally wouldn't but it's far from an autopick. For early general feats, I'm usually picking adopted ancestry (for specific builds), canny acumen (if I have a weak save), or something generically good like fleet or toughness.
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I can see that point. This next part is tongue in cheek, but only a little. Everyone takes Untrained Improvisation at 3, or Clever Improviser at either 1 or 5, right? I mean it's just so much better than every other General Feat. I mean there are other good ones, but not that good.Even just working as I believe it's intended, on the skills listed in the book, it gives the largest single bonus in the game. For all the RAW power gamers out there, it gives you a bonus to any lore skill required, as all lore skills are skills, and it doesn't specifically exclude them. Starting at 7th level, you are effectively trained in all knowledge that exists.
I haven't taken it with any of the 4 character's I've built. It's best for characters that have fewer trained skills than necessary, which is a problem I solve with [Ancestry] Lore. Also, 2 of my characters are wizards and another is a rogue.
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I am with Captain Morgan. Adn is what I do in my table.
When they find a creature, if they ask what skills are good to use with Recall Knowleadge, I tell them "You can use "Religion or Arcana". Then my players can decide who is going to try to Recall.
It´s fast, I don´t give the info if the players don´t ask for it (so they need to get involved and interested).
If you know something about Religion or Arcana, maybe you have heard about this creature... if not, maybe you don´t want to spread false rumors.
Also when they ask about the skills related to Recall knowleadge, I tell them if a check is harder because the creature is Uncommon or Unique. In my mind the characters should know if creature is common ("OK, another skellie coming to us") or is Unique ("Wow, that big mash of bones and flesh, never seen something like that before!")
This is more or less what I do too, although I don't necessarily tell them about uncommon.
I wonder if a lot of people who feel that secret checks get in the way of "agency" were also playing in groups that don't tell you which skill you'd be using?
Because when deciding on whether to Recall Knowledge, knowing whether I'm good a the skill is the "agency" I need, not the physical act of handling the dice.
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I can see that point. This next part is tongue in cheek, but only a little. Everyone takes Untrained Improvisation at 3, or Clever Improviser at either 1 or 5, right? I mean it's just so much better than every other General Feat. I mean there are other good ones, but not that good.
Even just working as I believe it's intended, on the skills listed in the book, it gives the largest single bonus in the game. For all the RAW power gamers out there, it gives you a bonus to any lore skill required, as all lore skills are skills, and it doesn't specifically exclude them. Starting at 7th level, you are effectively trained in all knowledge that exists.
I will take CI at level 5 because human and no "better" choices, however even then the difference is still huge. For example at level 7 my INT10 warpriest will test (untrained) arcana at +7 and religion at +15 to +17 (expert or master proficiency and 18 WIS). Thats a full 8 to 10 points better check. Which means that even with this feat I will probably not want to do arcane recall knowledge skill checks ever.
The DC for a common level 7 monster is 23 by the way. So even with this feat an arcana check would require a 16+ (5% crit success, 20% success, 50% failure and 25% crit failure) while using religion this is at least an 8+ only (15% crit success, 50% success, 30 failure, 5% crit fail). Add a uncommon or higher level monster to the mix and chances to succeed with arcana will be reduced to a natural 20 with a very high chance to crit fail your check.
Comparing it to an expert skill with a higher ability boost is not a fair comparison. Unless you're a Rogue, you can only get 3 skills to legendary. All of your other skills will be trained or untrained. Untrained Improvisation reduces the difference in those remaining skills to -2. The vast majority of a proficiency bonus comes from your level.
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I am with Captain Morgan. Adn is what I do in my table.
When they find a creature, if they ask what skills are good to use with Recall Knowleadge, I tell them "You can use "Religion or Arcana". Then my players can decide who is going to try to Recall.
It´s fast, I don´t give the info if the players don´t ask for it (so they need to get involved and interested).
If you know something about Religion or Arcana, maybe you have heard about this creature... if not, maybe you don´t want to spread false rumors.
Also when they ask about the skills related to Recall knowleadge, I tell them if a check is harder because the creature is Uncommon or Unique. In my mind the characters should know if creature is common ("OK, another skellie coming to us") or is Unique ("Wow, that big mash of bones and flesh, never seen something like that before!")
So how do you hide the fact that it's a shapeshifter, and not the common animal it appears to be?
Do you lie to them and tell them you're using their +15 Nature, when in fact you are using their +0 Arcana? Or do you tell them it uses Arcana, thus giving away the fact that it's not a normal animal?
The simple act of telling them the skill is giving them free information, either true or false, regardless of their success.
Comparing it to an expert skill with a higher ability boost is not a fair comparison. Unless you're a Rogue, you can only get 3 skills to legendary. All of your other skills will be trained or untrained. Untrained Improvisation reduces the difference in those remaining skills to -2. The vast majority of a proficiency bonus comes from your level.
But you're not just one person, you're an entire adventuring party. A feat that lets you become mediocre at everything really doesn't look all that appealing when the party as a whole can be great or amazing at everything.
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Comparing it to an expert skill with a higher ability boost is not a fair comparison. Unless you're a Rogue, you can only get 3 skills to legendary. All of your other skills will be trained or untrained. Untrained Improvisation reduces the difference in those remaining skills to -2. The vast majority of a proficiency bonus comes from your level.But you're not just one person, you're an entire adventuring party. A feat that lets you become mediocre at everything really doesn't look all that appealing when the party as a whole can be great or amazing at everything.
Your compatriots being great at Athletics and Acrobatics isn't going to free you from a grapple, or help you not fall in Grease.
Your compatriots being great at Athletics and Acrobatics isn't going to free you from a grapple, or help you not fall in Grease.
In the case of a grapple, sure. Your likelihood of beating the escape DC of a monster around your level will be very low (especially with a low strength score), but hey it lets you attempt it at least.
As for Grease, untrained improv doesn't help you at all. Grease makes creatures attempt an acrobatics or reflex save and it is literally impossible for an untrained improv acrobatics to be worse than your save.
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Comparing it to an expert skill with a higher ability boost is not a fair comparison. Unless you're a Rogue, you can only get 3 skills to legendary. All of your other skills will be trained or untrained. Untrained Improvisation reduces the difference in those remaining skills to -2. The vast majority of a proficiency bonus comes from your level.
It is exactly fair as I only want to roll recall knowledge skills checks that I am good at as otherwise my actions may very well be wasted on wrong intel.
There are 6 skills relevant to recall knowledge when identifying creatures and my warpriest has exactly one that he will keep at a maximum (as you already explained you can only keep 3 at maximum at best), which for obvious reasons is religion. Of those 6 a total of 4 is based in INT and only 2 are based on WIS, so rolls on most of those are very likely to fail or critically fail and provide false information even when using clever improviser and I do not want to waste actions on these rolls.
And if I only have one relevant skill that means that for any single type/trait monster there only is a 1 in 6 chance that my skill will be the correct skill and even if I have a 60% chance of succeeding the roll the chance of actually getting useful information out of my action are about 10%. In contrary 90% of the time I will either be getting no info or plain wrong info.
So if any creature appears and skill as well as check are secret I will never ever use recall knowledge and waste my actions until I know for sure that my character is in the undead crypt of undead undead. Numbers matter!
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Comparing it to an expert skill with a higher ability boost is not a fair comparison. Unless you're a Rogue, you can only get 3 skills to legendary. All of your other skills will be trained or untrained. Untrained Improvisation reduces the difference in those remaining skills to -2. The vast majority of a proficiency bonus comes from your level.
This has become a bit of a dogma for some, but you don't have to go all the way up to Legendary, you could also aim to have more Master skills.
Sure, you won't have peak bonuses, but you might access more good skill feats.
Realizing a bear is acting oddly (and may in fact be a shapeshifter) seems like it'd be a separate perception check the GM does without telling the players, anyway.
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I am with Captain Morgan. Adn is what I do in my table.
When they find a creature, if they ask what skills are good to use with Recall Knowleadge, I tell them "You can use "Religion or Arcana". Then my players can decide who is going to try to Recall.
It´s fast, I don´t give the info if the players don´t ask for it (so they need to get involved and interested).
If you know something about Religion or Arcana, maybe you have heard about this creature... if not, maybe you don´t want to spread false rumors.
Also when they ask about the skills related to Recall knowleadge, I tell them if a check is harder because the creature is Uncommon or Unique. In my mind the characters should know if creature is common ("OK, another skellie coming to us") or is Unique ("Wow, that big mash of bones and flesh, never seen something like that before!")
So how do you hide the fact that it's a shapeshifter, and not the common animal it appears to be?
Do you lie to them and tell them you're using their +15 Nature, when in fact you are using their +0 Arcana? Or do you tell them it uses Arcana, thus giving away the fact that it's not a normal animal?
The simple act of telling them the skill is giving them free information, either true or false, regardless of their success.
I think rules as written you need to make a perception check against the deception DC of the shapeshifter to tell they are in disguise. Otherwise I'd say you'd just be rolling against the creature they are appearing as.
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There is problem: How to identity each other without knowing, or what's DC when monster tries to identity PCs.
e.g.: Strix Ancestry is Rare, but Strix kinmate is uncommon. Only shoony kept rarity.
Why did you necro this thread just to ask this? It's irrelevant to the thread. Also who cares what NPCs do, that's all on the GMs side. If they know they know.
I agree with Cordell Kintner that reviving this thread to ask a new question is counterproductive. Asking the question in a fresh thread would get more answers.
However, as a GM I have had NPCs roll to identify the PCs. I feel it fair to force the NPCs to use up actions just like the PCs would.
The guidance on identifying creatures is on page 505 of the Core Rulebook, in the Gamemastering chapter under Recall Knowledge: "On most topics, you can use simple DCs for checks to Recall Knowledge. For a check about a specific creature, trap, or other subject with a level, use a level-based DC (adjusting for rarity as needed). You might adjust the difficulty down, maybe even drastically, if the subject is especially notorious or famed."
The level-based DCs are in Table 10-5: DCs by Level. Uncommon increases the DC by 2, and rare increases the DC by 5. The skill involved for identifying a humanoid is Society.
Note that this is the DC for identifying abilities of the individual creature, not just the species. It is like knowing the difference between a Hobgoblin Soldier DC 15, a Hobgoblin Archer DC 19, and a Hobgoblin General DC 22. The DC for 1st level is 15, and I use that for identifying the species and the common species abilities of a PC without identifying its individual abilities, but this is just my individual decision.
A creature failing to identify a PC's species was a plot point in my PF2-converted Ironfang Invasion campaign. The party needed to get into a celebration with Korred guards keeping out non-fey creatures. "Despite their insular nature, korreds love to dance. On certain auspicious dates, korreds hold great festivals of music and dance in ancient stone circles deep within forest glades. A few non-korred fey sometimes receive invitations to these dances, but any non-fey who interrupts the dance is berated at best or attacked at worst."
Two party members, a fey-blooded gnome and a halfling, approached the guards. The korreds were reluctantly willing to let the gnome in, because fey-blooded means she counted as fey. But they did not recognize the halfling, which are uncommon in the Fangwood. I had both guards roll Recall Knowledge Society, an untrained skill for them. They both failed the DC 15. And the halfling used his expertise in Deception to explain that he was a rare fey called a chergl. He rolled well, so they believed him and let him in, too.
As the difference between identifying a 1st-level strix PC at DC 20 due to the +5 for rarity and a Strix Kinmate creature 2 at DC 18 due to the +2 for uncommon, the PC is more unusual than the NPC. For example, strix PCs cannot fly before they take Fledgeling Flight feat 5. The kinmates have fly speed 25 feet, like anyone would expect from winged creatures.