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All of the exploration activities make sense to me and we use them to great effect, however my players and I have a disagreement on how Avoid Notice works.
The rogue player wants me to roll stealth in secret, and then he wants to run all around the map opening doors and peeking around corners and assuming his stealth roll is greater than the perception DC of the enemies (It usually is) he can just go back to the party wherever they are waiting and give them all the information about the enemies and the map layout.
How long is he unnoticed? Can he pass through a room with enemies and into another room?
The rule as I read it is he does not roll a stealth check until we roll initiative as soon as he runs into enemies. Then, as long as his stealth initiative roll beats their perception DC's he is unnoticed until he does something on his turn to become observed, or the enemies use seek to locate him.
The problem with my method is, he is still very likely to be able to peek into a room, remain unnoticed and then retreat back to the party. By rolling initiative and playing it all out in encounter mode instead we've just made it take longer.
All of the exploration activities make sense to me and we use them to great effect, however my players and I have a disagreement on how Avoid Notice works.
The rogue player wants me to roll stealth in secret, and then he wants to run all around the map opening doors and peeking around corners and assuming his stealth roll is greater than the perception DC of the enemies (It usually is) he can just go back to the party wherever they are waiting and give them all the information about the enemies and the map layout.
How long is he unnoticed? Can he pass through a room with enemies and into another room?
The rule as I read it is he does not roll a stealth check until we roll initiative as soon as he runs into enemies. Then, as long as his stealth initiative roll beats their perception DC's he is unnoticed until he does something on his turn to become observed, or the enemies use seek to locate him.
The problem with my method is, he is still very likely to be able to peek into a room, remain unnoticed and then retreat back to the party. By rolling initiative and playing it all out in encounter mode instead we've just made it take longer.
There aren't hard and fast rules, so it mostly comes down to judgement calls. I think whenever there's significant change in the situation, they should roll stealth. No one else needs to roll initiative until you know that result.
So every room he peeks in with enemies should probably call for a stealth roll against the perception DCs of anyone inside. Then you might require a stealth check for other things, like if they have to move past the enemies or cross an area within their line of sight without cover.
Terrain is going to play a very big factor here. The rogue probably can't sneak past the enemies in a long empty hallway, for example, but he might be able to creep around the edges of the library.
Like Captain Morgan said, it mostly seems to be up to the GM to determine the exact specifics & I'd agree with a general rule of thumb for "whenever there's significant change in the situation, they should roll stealth."
Personally, I'm unsure Avoid Notice is most appropriate here - since exploration activities seem primarily for situations that lack immediate danger, which I wouldn't consider to include a high-risk dive into enemy territory that could break out into combat at any moment.
If using Avoid Notice anyway, I wouldn't call for a new check just for peeking around a corner unless enemies happened to be looking right there or something. But things like opening doors, going through a room with enemies, etc should probably prompt an additional check (I'd warn the player first and let them decide to go through with the action or not). I'd also note that the sneak action is limited to half-movement while saying, "You don’t get to roll against a creature if, at the end of your movement, you neither are concealed from it nor have cover or greater cover against it. You automatically become observed by such a creature." Using that as a guideline, I'd impose a distance limit for any travel during Avoid Notice across distances in which a character could potentially be spotted.
If the player is sneaking through a mapped area (as in you made out an actual combat grid for gameplay), depending on the situation I would say it may be reasonable to drop into a modification of combat mode where each sneak action requires a stealth check & you don't bother rolling enemy initiative until they actually realize they're in an encounter (i.e. a stealth check crit fails or a failure would require turn order to see how things play out).
Or as another alternative, you could look into the Infiltration or Victory Point subsystems from the GMG to frame the entire scouting sequence as a series of skill checks with successes raising points to gather info on the location/enemies and failures increasing enemy awareness that something is going on - potentially making further checks harder or giving away your Rogue's presence if they fail enough of them.
Thenobledrake, I believe, has the RAW of this absolutely correct.
For my party, if someone wants to scout like this I'd allow them to do so with the caveat that they need to be separate enough from the party that the rest of the party won't be able to provide aid for a couple of rounds if they are caught.
Its also worth making sure you've read the rules for Sneak, as a failed check merely makes you Hidden instead of undetected. A guard or other foe doesn't necessarily know if he heard an marauding adventurer or a harmless rat until they make a successful Seek action.
"It was probably just the wind."
As for the counterintuitive nature of the exploration rules... I think that might be a case where the rules text would be a lot more intuitive to a person that has never learned the rules to a TTRPG before than they are to someone that knows how to play another version of Pathfinder or D&D, because all the words are there to give the understanding of when and why to use them and how they work when you do, but people that have a preconception about how to handle "I'm sneaking around" are not prepared for how different the PF2 approach deliberately is.
Dunno... the rules read and play fine for overland travel and occasional encounters or in large, more or less "empty" environments like large cavern systems, but not for the usually thightly packed dungeons with monsters and hazards behind literally every door and corner. And the transition in between explo and encounter when stealth is involved is still badly explained.
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They've been working just fine for me in dungeon environments though, which is why I was trying to posit a reason why they aren't working for others too.
Dunno... the rules read and play fine for overland travel and occasional encounters or in large, more or less "empty" environments like large cavern systems, but not for the usually thightly packed dungeons with monsters and hazards behind literally every door and corner.
Well, if you are content in keeping the group together at all times and/or just to use stealth for initiative and starting an encounter undetected/hidden as the party Rogue everything works well. Where people are getting confused on a regular basis is the out of encounter party Rogue/Ranger/Monk solo stealth mission aka mundane information gathering.
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The first line says, "You attempt a Stealth check to avoid notice while traveling at half speed." It does not say that it makes you Hidden or Undetected the whole time. That would be a Stealth check to Hide or Sneak. Avoid Notice is what the ability goes on to define, and is not a secret check. In fact, there is no check called for until you are about to enter encounter mode, and then the check is your initiative roll. What you are wanting to do is Hide and Sneak, which aren't covered by Exploration Mode.
Now, it's reasonable if you make the stealth roll and beat the enemies' perception DC (thus starting Encounter Mode undetected) for the GM to not bother rolling their initiatives. But if you're actively Sneaking through a room with enemies in it, you really should go into encounter mode, because you need to know whether or not you make it to cover at the end of every action. You have to move at half speed (unless you have an ability to move faster), so you may not be able to get through a room completely unobserved.
By the look of it, the GM makes the secret roll at the end of each Sneak action, so if it takes you three to get across the room, that's three checks. And if at the end of any of them you don't have cover or concealment, the you become detected, because, "You don’t get to roll against a creature if, at the end of your movement, you neither are concealed from it nor have cover or greater cover against it. You automatically become observed by such a creature."
So if you've got a standard 25 foot move and aren't able to move more than half speed, then you have to be able to get to cover within 10 feet of where you started, or you're not going to be able to sneak through the room.
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The line in the back of the book is a shortened version of the ability, and the ability provides the full details about how it works. You are undetected at the start of an Encounter if you make the stealth check. Whether you make that when you enter Exploration mode or when the Encounter begins doesn't matter. It's one check, which is your initiative, and if you make it, then you are undetected at the start of the encounter.
And how is scouting in a dungeon not a dungeon crawl?
The rogue player wants me to roll stealth in secret, and then he wants to run all around the map opening doors and peeking around corners and assuming his stealth roll is greater than the perception DC of the enemies (It usually is) he can just go back to the party wherever they are waiting and give them all the information about the enemies and the map layout.
You can't do that with Exploration mode. You need to go into Encounter Mode when you come to an Encounter. If you open a door to a room with a creature in it, you're no longer exploring. There's a reason it's Encounter Mode and not Combat now, because it covers other situations.
If it's an abstracted get past the guards at the city gates, or travel without attracting attention, then sure, use Exploration Mode or a single stealth check. Because if everyone makes the stealth check, there's no reason to run the rest of the encounter. If it's run around the dungeon opening doors an peeking around corners, then you need to go into Encounter Mode when you get to an Encounter.
Edit: Note the use of lowercase avoid notice in the first sentence, as opposed to the capitalized Avoid Notice in "If you’re Avoiding Notice at the start of an encounter, you usually roll a Stealth check instead of a Perception check both to determine your initiative and to see if the enemies notice you (based on their Perception DCs, as normal for Sneak, regardless of their initiative check results)." That's because one is a general description of the ability, and one is referencing the rules term and giving you the effect of that rule.
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Yeah so as the good book says:
If you’re Avoiding Notice at the start of an encounter, you usually roll a Stealth check instead of a Perception check both to determine your initiative and to see if the enemies notice you (based on their Perception DCs, as normal for Sneak, regardless of their initiative check results).
If your Stealth check beats their Perception DC, then you haven't been noticed (yet). This has a defined rules meaning:
Unnoticed
If you are unnoticed by a creature, that creature has no idea you are present at all. When you’re unnoticed, you’re also undetected by the creature. This condition matters for abilities that can be used only against targets totally unaware of your presence.
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Suppose your rogue is the only character involved in the encounter (the rest of the party is a few rooms away), you run into some monsters, but you succeed in Avoid Notice. Then you haven't been noticed, they don't know you're there. Do you roll initiative? I believe the Gamemastery Guide provides updated advice for that:
When do you ask players to roll initiative? In most cases, it’s pretty simple: you call for the roll as soon as one participant intends to attack (or issue a challenge, draw a weapon, cast a preparatory spell, start a social encounter such as a debate, or otherwise begin to use an action that their foes can’t help but notice).
So if the rogue decides not to attack, no initiative is needed, because the enemies (entirely unaware of the rogue) also don't intend to attack. The rogue can just quietly sneak back to the party and report.
If the rogue does decide to attack, then (by that same text) the rogue goes from unnoticed to undetected, which is covered by the next section;
So what do you do if someone rolls better than everyone else on initiative, but all their foes beat their Perception DC? Well, all the enemies are undetected, but not unnoticed. That means the participant who rolled high still knows someone is around, and can start moving about, Seeking, and otherwise preparing to fight. The characters Avoiding Notice still have a significant advantage, since that character needs to spend actions and attempt additional checks in order to find them.
Now suppose that instead of attacking, you want to try to sneak through the room with the monsters in it. This is a lot harder than approaching an area, spotting monsters, and backing off again. If you're trying to go closely past the monsters, you are going into an encounter mode, because that's clearly the sort of situation described in the CRB:
When every individual action counts, you enter the encounter mode of play.
Now you have to use Sneak and Hide actions to move from cover to cover, never standing still without anything to hide behind. However, you aren't Noticed just because you decided to do anything; sneaking around is precisely the sort of thing that enemies could help noticing. That's the whole point of it.
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Another example: suppose the whole party is using Avoid Notice. The party is traveling through the Big Slimy Swamp to get to Boggardsburg and they're trying not to run into patrols on the way, because they don't want the burg to raise the alarm and activate its defenses. On their way through the swamp they run into a boggard patrol, but amazingly, they all roll well enough on Stealth to beat the boggards' Perception DC. The boggards haven't noticed a single one of the PCs. The PCs could just sit very quietly and let the boggard patrol walk by, and no encounter happens.
I agree with Ascalaphus. Encounter Mode != Combat. This can be handled just fine using Encounter Mode and Sneak Actions. You don't roll Initiative until you fail a Sneak check, or decide to Attack.
Now, this is risky, as Sneak is a Secret check, so you won't know for sure that you're going to be safe, but if this is your planned strategy, Terrain Stalker eliminates the need to roll, as long as you stay in appropriate terrain. Moving 5 feet per Action isn't really a huge drawback if you aren't in Combat, especially since you were already only moving 10-15 feet per Sneak, depending on Ancestry.
Exploration mode is not appropriate for moving room to room in an active dungeon.
You don't roll Initiative until you fail a Sneak check, or decide to Attack.That's neither what the core book says on the matter, nor sensible as it frames the situation as any creatures that might be patrolling, pacing, or otherwise in the area doing things that might complicate your stealthy endeavor are actually locked in stasis until you intend to attack them or fail a stealth check.
The rules actually support rolling initiative, even if you're opponents won't know you are there to try and interact with, because the order of actions matter - do you cross the archway and find cover before the guard Strides over and Seeks out it? Are you standing in unobstructed view when the cook goes to grab a few more potatoes from the larder? and so on.
Ascalaphus already quoted the relevant guidance from the GMG. Choosing to ignore the GMG is the same mistake as reading the first line and ignoring the rest of the text.
You don't need to roll Initiative for the enemies to get Actions. The GM can simply move each enemy once for every move you make.
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Yeah so as the good book says:
If you’re Avoiding Notice at the start of an encounter, you usually roll a Stealth check instead of a Perception check both to determine your initiative and to see if the enemies notice you (based on their Perception DCs, as normal for Sneak, regardless of their initiative check results).If your Stealth check beats their Perception DC, then you haven't been noticed (yet). This has a defined rules meaning:
Unnoticed
If you are unnoticed by a creature, that creature has no idea you are present at all. When you’re unnoticed, you’re also undetected by the creature. This condition matters for abilities that can be used only against targets totally unaware of your presence.---
Suppose your rogue is the only character involved in the encounter (the rest of the party is a few rooms away), you run into some monsters, but you succeed in Avoid Notice. Then you haven't been noticed, they don't know you're there. Do you roll initiative? I believe the Gamemastery Guide provides updated advice for that:
When do you ask players to roll initiative? In most cases, it’s pretty simple: you call for the roll as soon as one participant intends to attack (or issue a challenge, draw a weapon, cast a preparatory spell, start a social encounter such as a debate, or otherwise begin to use an action that their foes can’t help but notice).So if the rogue decides not to attack, no initiative is needed, because the enemies (entirely unaware of the rogue) also don't intend to attack. The rogue can just quietly sneak back to the party and report.
If the rogue does decide to attack, then (by that same text) the rogue goes from unnoticed to undetected, which is covered by the next section;
So what do you do if someone rolls better than everyone else on initiative, but all their foes beat their Perception DC? Well, all the enemies are undetected, but not unnoticed....
I don’t own the GMG, so I’m not as familiar with the quotes in there, but... none of this really contradicts what I said, and is basically how I would run it.
The thing to remember is that the Stealth check doesn’t matter until there could possibly be an encounter. If everyone makes the check, then everyone is going to start encounter mode hidden. And if the boggards aren’t actively seeking, they would just walk by. If the boggards are actively seeking, then they get a check for every action they spend to do so. Whether the GM drops you into initiative or not, you’re essentially in encounter mode at that point. If they’re spending multiple rounds actively Seeking, then you have to spend multiple rounds actively Hiding. Edit: looking at it again, it’s less clear you have to make a new hide check each round if you aren’t doing anything else. If you try to move or anything while they are seeking, then you would need one.
Yes, a Rogue can Avoid Notice and move up to an encounter, then back away. But Avoid Notice does not cover opening a door and having the moving door avoid being noticed. To me, that is a separate roll, and if you do that in a room full of creatures at the very least you’re taking a penalty on a new stealth check. If all you intend to do is open the door and look inside, there’s no need to roll initiative, but it’s also not going to be covered by the stealth check you made an hour ago when you started creeping around. And if you fail the check, then you’re in initiative.
One last point to keep in mind is that exploration activities are repeated 10 times per minute. Even if you’re rolling a Stealth check for traveling, the roll you used to sneak past the boggards an hour ago isn’t the roll you’re using to sneak past the guards now. Why don’t we have players roll a bunch of times while traveling? Because it would be a waste of time during the game, and because there are no consequences to them failing a roll when there is no encounter. So instead they roll when there is a potential encounter. Ie when they would normally be rolling initiative. Each time they would otherwise be rolling initiative.
Don’t confuse rules designed around saving time at the table with being able to make a single check to avoid everything. Exploration mode is not roll once. Exploration mode allows you to make the appropriate roll when it matters. It’s the same with Searching. You don’t make one perception check and if you fail miss everything on the 8 hour trip that you could possibly have seen. You get to make a Perception check each time there is something that you could possibly see, because you’re spending your time searching. There’s no need to actually make that check until it matters.
Choosing to ignore the GMG is the same mistake as reading the first line and ignoring the rest of the text....except that the GMG is an optional rules-expansion book, not a piece of the Core Rules. The game is designed to be able to be run with just the core rulebook.
And to phrase differently:
Step one of Encounter Mode is "Roll Initiative." That proves beyond any reasonable doubt that if you are "using Encounter Mode and Sneak Actions" (to quote you) that you supposed to have rolled initiative.
Edit to address the added portion:
You don't need to roll Initiative for the enemies to get Actions. The GM can simply move each enemy once for every move you make.Here's a relevant quote from the book: "When every individual action counts, you enter the encounter mode of play."
So yes, you can skip the initiative roll and have actions happen in whatever order you want them to as you describe - but at that point it's very clear you're deviating from the rules of the Pathfinder 2nd edition game.
Even the CRB itself gives an example of not rolling Initiative until a fight breaks out, and states that Initiative is usually rolled at the start of an Encounter, but not always.
ROLLING INITIATIVE
Transitioning from exploration to an encounter usually
involves rolling for initiative. Call for initiative once a
trap is triggered, as soon as two opposing groups come
into contact, or when a creature on one side decides to
take action against the other. For example:
• A group of PCs are exploring a cavern. They enter
a narrow passage patrolled by a group of kobold
warriors. Now that the two groups are in the same
area, it’s time to roll initiative.
• Amiri and a kobold champion agree to have
a friendly wrestling match. They square off
on a patch of dirt, and you call for initiative
using Athletics.
• Merisiel and Kyra are negotiating with the kobold
king. Things aren’t going well, so Merisiel decides
to launch a surprise attack. As soon as she says
this is her plan, you call for initiative.
• Harsk and Ezren are trying to Balance across a
narrow beam to reach an isolated kobold treasure
trove. When they get halfway across, a red dragon
who was hiding behind the mountain flies around
to attack! As soon as the dragon makes its
appearance, you call for an initiative roll.
Which doesn’t mean that you haven’t transitioned from exploration mode to encounter mode. Only that there’s no need to go into initiative in some instances of encounter mode.
Right. That's 100% what I have said.
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Which doesn’t mean that you haven’t transitioned from exploration mode to encounter mode. Only that there’s no need to go into initiative in some instances of encounter mode.Right. That's 100% what I have said.
Which means you aren’t using your stealth check from exploration mode anymore? I’m not sure where you disagree with what I’ve stated if you agree that you are going into encounter mode.
Which means you aren’t using your stealth check from exploration mode anymore? I’m not sure where you disagree with what I’ve stated if you agree that you are going into encounter mode.Which doesn’t mean that you haven’t transitioned from exploration mode to encounter mode. Only that there’s no need to go into initiative in some instances of encounter mode.Right. That's 100% what I have said.
I believe you and I are in agreement. I was responding to thenobledrake.
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Thanks everyone for your input on this issue. It would seem there is still some confusion around this rule. I think we all interpret it mostly the same way...
I can easily see how a PC could read this rule and assume one Stealth roll would be sufficient until something sees them or they choose to do something else.
However as a GM that sets off OP alarms
Grimm and I have decided it will work like this, which we both believe is the spirit of the rule, and I think what everyone is saying here too:
-We don't have to roll initiative unless he's spotted and the enemies want to attack him.
-He needs to roll his stealth check once for every room/area he peeks into, or if he does anything else that might get noticed like opening a window or door or something.
-If he spots enemies in the room and isn't noticed he can retreat while still in exploration mode. If he wants to try to sneak through the area or attack them, or do anything else that might get him spotted we will enter encounter mode to play it out with the specific rules for those actions. (Such as sneaking and hiding)
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And uh... am I the only one thinking adding a second book to the discussion defaults to blurring the details rather than clarifying them?
The rules work fine, as I've described, without owning the GMG.
Choosing to ignore the GMG is the same mistake as reading the first line and ignoring the rest of the text....except that the GMG is an optional rules-expansion book, not a piece of the Core Rules. The game is designed to be able to be run with just the core rulebook.
I don't agree with this dismissal of the GMG. Let's look at the table of contents:
Chapter 1 - GameMastery Basics
Chapter 2 - Tools
Chapter 3 - Subsystems
Chapter 4 - Variant Rules
Chapter 5 - NPC Gallery
Only one chapter is actually these optional rules that you paint the whole book as. The part I'm citing is from chapter 1, which is focused on GMing techniques. Much of it is focused on clarifying parts of the CRB. So when people are in doubt how to actually use parts of the CRB, looking at the GMG for advice is totally appropriate.