Would you allow knowledge (local) check for events that aren't local?

[Senko]

I'm just wondering would you allow knowledge local to be rolled for events that aren't local or would you just not let them know it? Say you have a 1st level character in Mwangi and they see someone who was a major hero in AP Tian Xa could they make a knowledge local to recognize them or would they be so far outside the local area they just don't get a check?

[Rysky]

In 3.5 you had to specify a specific area for Local, I believe? In P1 no such distinction exists to my knowledge.

[ErichAD]

You should, that's how the rules work at any rate.

You'd potentially get some information out of the check, but it could be meaningless if you don't have any background information.

"Oh hey, that's the type of armor Blobchak defier of the Ribald infanerium would wear, bet that's him."
"What's umm... all that mean?"
"No idea. It's just what he's called."

It'd make more sense to give them accessible information though. Maybe you judge by their age and dress that they were likely involved in the incident they are most famous for.

[Senko]

ErichAD wrote:

You should, that's how the rules work at any rate.

You'd potentially get some information out of the check, but it could be meaningless if you don't have any background information.

"Oh hey, that's the type of armor Blobchak defier of the Ribald infanerium would wear, bet that's him."
"What's umm... all that mean?"
"No idea. It's just what he's called."

It'd make more sense to give them accessible information though. Maybe you judge by their age and dress that they were likely involved in the incident they are most famous for.

I can't help but picture

Player: I roll a 8
DM: You see a woman wearing a mask watching the auction silently. The mask vaguely resembles a fox . . . you realize she's a kitsune.
Player wearing a fox mask: "Wait, what? I'm a magaambyan druid and human!"

[Bjørn Røyrvik]

Information Overload

[Bjørn Røyrvik]

Rysky wrote:

In 3.5 you had to specify a specific area for Local, I believe?

Pretty sure you don't. Rules don't say anything like that, in any case.

I rule K.Local in this way: you choose an area, of a size specified at time of taking the skill (from a town or city district up to a small country), and you can use the skill for any number of other skill rolls in that area: History, Nobility, Geography, possibly religion. When replacing other skills the DC increases a little (from +1 to +5, usually), and DCs also increase the larger the area you choose.

In the OP's case, unless said hero did some heroing in Mwangi, Knowledge (local: Mwangi) wouldn't help under my rules. By RAW it would. because the rules don't make sense. You can have intimate knowledge of places you've literally never heard of.

[W E Ray]

I always felt it was a laughably bad name for the Skill.

My 'advice' is to forget the incorrect name and just look at the RAW description:
"legends, personalities, inhabitants, laws, customs, traditions, Humanoids"

It has Nothing to do with 'merely' Local information. Nothing.

.

In my games, because I lump Nobility, Geography, History and most of Local into "Society" -- from PF Unchained -- I just use this Skill as 'Knowledge: Humanoids"

So,.... One uses Arcane to see if your PC ever learned about Dragons, Magical Beasts, or Constructs. And one uses Nature for Monstrous Humanoids and Fey, etc.
'Hey, Bard, is that Dragon the kind that has a Lightning breath weapon like the one we ran away from last month?' (Bard rolls Arcane.) 'Nope, that one isn't even a real Dragon, it's a Drake; we don't have to run this time!' (other PCs wonder how he knows) 'Hmm, I wonder if it's the shape of the draco-thingy's snout, or maybe the size of its wings. Ah well, who cares, that's why we have the Bard!'

And for Humanoid -- well, they're based on Racial abilities and Class Levels. In other words, when you encounter a Goblin or an Elf you roll your "Local" (change the name to something not stupid), and learn, as a result of your roll, that this Elf deals precision damage, has a good Ref Save & Evasion, a few minor Rogue Talents, and a Racially low Constitution. ....But perhaps you didn't roll high enough to learn that it's specifically has 4d6 Precision Damage and which Rogue Talents.

It's up to you if you want the Core and Base Classes to be the standard DC 10 +CR for the Knowledge DC, while the Occult or Hybrid Classes are 15 +CR -- or maybe all the Classes are 10 +CR but many of the Prestige Classes and Alternate Racial Traits are 15 +CR. I think that depends on your game and how often y'all use all the Splat options.

[Mark Hoover 330]

W E Ray: THANK you for articulating that about knowledge checks on humanoids. I've been running my games like that for years, with fluff around the knowledge checks as well as some solid PC/NPC class info. Most humanoids advance through class levels or CAN advance through class levels, and some of that might be glimpsed by a knowledge check.

Think about it; in one AP, the very first chapter involves a group of humanoids attacking a town. These humanoids in the setting are known to be one of several "tribes" operating in the area. Couldn't identification of the tribe, through Knowledge: Local, and specifically identifying tribal dress, armament and mannerisms, suggest a vocation for a particular tribe member?

This one's a typical warrior, that one's likely a mounted warrior, likely to be good with X weapon, and the vestments of that one make me think our party's Cleric should use Knowledge: Religion to ID the god that tribal priestess worships and what kind of powers they might have.

In game terms, I don't have any problem telling players that roll high enough some basic character class basics when humanoids show up. I'm mentioning all of this b/c I've had at least 2 players in my games and one friend who is a GM balk at the idea that a Knowledge check might identify a Class, not just a Race.

[Senko]

Perhaps I should change the name to knowledge culture then and just have an unranked "local knowledge" roll for your area. Appeals to me more I think.

[Mysterious Stranger]

First thing I would say is that the DC for something like that would be pretty high. I would consider that to be “a really tough question” so would put the DC at 30. That seems reasonable to recognize someone from the other side of the world. Second I am not sure that knowledge local would be the right knowledge. If the person is famous he would be someone of historical significance so maybe knowledge history would be better. If the person is noble knowledge nobility would also be appropriate.

So chances are a 1st level character is not going to be able to make the roll unless they invested serious resources in the relevant knowledge. Even someone with an 18 INT who has the knowledge skill as a class skill will only have +8 which means they need to roll a 22 on a d20. Since a natural 20 on a skill does not mean you succeeded that means the character fails. If you are a human and choose skill focus and scholar for your 1st level feats that bumps your roll to a +13 which means you need a 17 or better.

Something like that could also require multiple rolls. Identify a creature's ethnicity requires a DC 10 knowledge geography. You might first have to succeed at recognizing the person is form Tian Xu before you can figure out who he is. The DC for that is pretty low but if the character does not have the skill there is still a good chance they will fail.

Putting all of this together the 1st level character would need to roll a 10 or higher (A DC 10 or lower can be made even if you are not trained in the skill), if they succeed they need to roll a DC 30 on the appropriate knowledge skill.

[Senko]

I did consider history but lets say they've adventured 1-10, are there briefly to negotiate things and then will return to adventure 11-18. Modern history still seems less applicable as its something happening rahter than something that has happened. If you see what I mean.

[Mark Hoover 330]

Hey, if we want to look at skills outside Knowledge, also consider the Profession skills. Is the person from the other side of the world wearing the particular uniform of a mercenary or military unit? Profession: Soldier. Are they a famous scholar or part of one such organization? Profession: Sage.

Heck, if you want to get granular, you could also use Perform or Craft skills in the same way as Perform; Diplomacy/Gather Info rolls for the PCs to pick up details about this person; a Perception check to eavesdrop on them, Bluff so that the eavesdropper is not found out, and then a Linguistics check to ID the origin of their accent.

Or... just roll Knowledge: Local to ID a humanoid and their culture.

Finally, consider the check by degrees. DC 10: you know this person is a foreigner to the Mwangi; DC 15: by their dress and mannerisms, this person is from Tian Xa; DC 20: by the way they carry/present themselves, this person is of great notoriety/importance in Tian Xa; DC 25: this person is a well known warrior or sorcerer or whatever in Tian Xa; DC 30: this person is so and so, the famous blah de blah of Tian Xa

Or something like that. There are several ways to skin this particular catoblepas, but I say by RAW Knowledge: Local is the place to start.

[W E Ray]

In my homegames I just went with what I felt was best -- evolving or changing In-Between' campaigns to keep consistent, and talking with the Players about the development of the Skills.

What stuck me was when I DMed PFS. Now, the vast majority of the time in the Scenarios it just says flat out, 'PCs can get answer X at this DC and can learn Y from that DC.'

Since I didn't DM PFS in convention halls with time constraints and such (except Free RPG Day), I could give the Players more freedom to roleplay through the Scenario and explore the setting and character of it -- as opposed to just robotically streamlining through the pages as though it's a competition to see what table can finish in less than four hours, an exercise in rolling dice as fast as one can.

As such, Players more often came up with questions that weren't spelled out in the Scenario and I had to use PFS RAW and regulations as well as I could to keep it as standardized as possible.

I actually borrowed from a Venture Lieutenant who did it this way:
at DC 10 +CR the PC would get the basic Flavor information and one bit of tactical information. And since 'for every 5 points above the initial DC you get more info' he let the players ask additional questions such as 'What's it's weakest Save' or 'What's it's strongest SU special attack' depending on how high above the base DC they get.

[Mark Hoover 330]

Again W E Ray... I do the same dang thing, except I never GM'd PFS.

PCs are APL 4 and encounter a Flame Drake. I tell them: "as you venture down the tunnel once carved by lava, the heat is nearly stifling. Rounding the corner, standing on the banks of a magma lake in the distance is a ferocious creature that looks like a red and yellow scaled dragon, but with only 2 legs"

The players ask some initial questions: what's the size of the creature, how far away, should we roll initiatives and such. As we get to the player running the Human Wizard (Fire Wizard)4, he throws a Knowledge: Arcana check, getting a 25.

I scroll down to the fluff of the creature, saying the following: this creature is a flame drake, a degenerate cousin of the true red dragon. They are rage-fueled bullies that terrorize their lands and demand harsh tribute from those they suffer to live within their hunting grounds.

I tell the player this is a Dragon type monster and that, as is obvious by where it's standing at the start of the fight the creature is immune to fire. Then I ask "what else do you want to know?" This is met by things like what are its other immunities, other defenses, strongest attack and so on. Since in this instance the PC got a 25 when they needed a 15, I'll remind the player they get to ask 2 questions.

The one thing I DO give away easily is the type of monster. My players are all serious vets of these games and have all GM'd in PF1 many times, so if I tell them the type is "dragon" it's very hard for these players not to know that it has an immunity to sleep, d12 HP and so on from that monster type, so I just allow that to be known.

[Senko]

Hmmm I think my first question if a DM did that to me rather than just telling me "X and y" information would always be "Is there something we can do to avoid a fight". Sure you may decide what you need to do is unreasonable or could be have more serious repurcussions from not dealing with them but any time you can deal with a creature without it devolving to combat is a win in my book. With your flame drake I might try offering it tribute I can live without as we've barged into its home.