Failures in 5e & Clunky in 3e: Which specific systems?

[Judging__Eagle]

So, while there are some parts of 3e that are clunky; and I've even seen people on these boards screw them up in PbP; which would be the larger offenders?

Some candidates that come to mind for elements people think are too complicated, don't work, or are often ignored:

-Non-lethal combat (also trippins, disarming, sundering, bullrushing; barely ever used, with sundering being an almost offensive choice)
-Grappling [Admittedly; Races of War covered it well enough for my group's use; and we're used to Living Greyhawk set in "Ket" (i.e. killing a human == your PC is an NPC) and the entire regions players and DMs have learned to put up with it]
-Posture (Standing, Crouching, Prone)[Crouching is interesting for Bow users (never listed, but should be +2 ranged AC, -2 melee AC; while Prone is potentially interesting for Spellcasters at +4 ranged AX, -4 melee AC]
-Stealth & Perception (Most people don't seem to know that there are Distance Mods to Perception; or that variable speeds can be used with penalties/bonuses to stealth checks)

Many of the other big offenders seem to have been tackled by [Tomes]. While the desire for varied classes, feats and options, seems to have been covered with the Community Material. Additionally, Kaelik's Spellcasting rewrites and [Tome] errata have covered the lack of revision on metamagic feats and spellcasting and touched up some aspects of [Tome]. Finally, Reb Rob's [Tome] magic items content has given a DMG's worth of magic items that take several points of view on making [Tome] viable magic items.

Aside from all that's been worked upon, what aspects of the game franchise's engine still have problems?

Social interaction? [honestly; I'd rather use an social interaction system based on AS' Chapter 6: "Getting What You Need" than make a new one up]

[Kaelik]

Social Interaction that isn't Magic Tea Party is still mostly garbage everywhere, but nothing in 3e's rules is an improvement.

Searching for traps or secret doors is a clunky mess that doesn't work at all on any level in 3e.

My errata basically just makes it passive always happening thing, which means that there is no such thing as actively searching for things, which has a bunch of flaws, but is still the best I could manage.

[erik]

Where is crouching from? I searched the srd and only got references to gaining improved cover by crouching as a move action in some terrains.

If crouching stance doesn't exist then I certainly see no reason to invent the one you described.


I think people forgetting distance mods for perception is a tacit rejection of their crappiness. Whenever someone insists on using the mods it results in stupidity.

[Judging__Eagle]

Kaelik,

Yeah, the fact that I've only ever seen one game (out of .. 85 TTRPG engines) have a remotely useable Social Interaction system is pretty damning of RPGs as a whole. The 'unfortunate' thing is that aside from After Sudown; there are no good systems to borrow from.

Making searching an "always on" thing does seem to be the most logical way to keep gameplay from being interrupted with players looking for hidden traps; while the MC is presenting traps as obvious magical architechture.

Erik,

I'm extrapolating "crouching" being half the effects that Prone has. I didn't invent the idea for use in d20, I might have seen it in a d20 Modern supplement regarding firearm combat; or simply decided it was logical because so many other turn-based computer games have a "crouching" option.

The real irony is that actual Dark Ages combat had a place for a "crouching" position with crossbowyers and the Pavis shield which does require the user to crouch behind them.


I've always found the opposite with distance mods to perception; they make the stealth portion of the tabletop grid wargame a lot more plausible, and less stupid.

When I don't use it, guards who are across the courtyard can auto-detect a Rogue who succeeded a Hide, but flubbed their Move Silently. Making Stealth an almost useless strategy for players to select since being far away from a sentry means nothing at all; while moving as close as possible to them isn't penalized or more risky.

However, when I do use the distance penalties; people who are stealthy will act like plausible ninjas who try to skirt the borders of the sentries perception; instead of simply rushing by them and relying upon their Hide/Move Silently checks.

The most recent example that I have of this came up a month or so ago in the first encounter of the Red Hand of Doom campaign. Several party members are decent at stealth; and performed a counter-ambush on the hobgoblins waiting to ambush us. The Warlock's Dretch pet (with Invisible on Unworked Stone) and Deep Halfling Rogue were in the lead; the Bard just behind them; and the Barbarian in the rear. Arranging themselves by most, to least, stealthy. Of course, after a certain threshold, the Hobs might have detected them; but the bard & barbarian held back and waited until they could just charge in a surprise round.

Honestly; I'd ascribe people refusing to use the Distance modifiers to stealth to be a result of not knowing how stealth or perception work at all. Compounded with the general laziness of the rules many groups and players seem to have.

[erik]

Crouching for an AC bonus can mostly be accomplished by using cover rules already in place. Crouching without cover only makes you a literal sitting target and frankly makes you an easier target at range or in melee.

[ishy]

Erik,

I'm extrapolating "crouching" being half the effects that Prone has. I didn't invent the idea for use in d20, I might have seen it in a d20 Modern supplement regarding firearm combat; or simply decided it was logical because so many other turn-based computer games have a "crouching" option.

The real irony is that actual Dark Ages combat had a place for a "crouching" position with crossbowyers and the Pavis shield which does require the user to crouch behind them.

There are crouching rules in the 3.5 phb. Look at the table with Armour class modifiers:

Kneeling or sitting: AC vs Melee [-2] AC vs Ranged [+2]

[erik]

Boooooo.

Looks like it was in 3e as well. *chews crow*
I still think it is redundant with cover rules and dumb since a sitting target it easier to hit than a moving target (and people are assumed to be moving) at range or otherwise, but it is definitely in da rules.

I don't suppose someone can explain why cowering gives -2 AC vs ranged attacks whereas sitting or kneeling gives +2. (I get the denial of dexterity bonus, but a +4 difference in AC on top of it vs. ranged seems bizarre)

Interesting that from 3e to 3.5 the modifiers changed from attack modifiers to AC modifiers. I suppose it does make more sense as AC modifiers, so add that to the few 3.5 changes that were actual steps forward (even if it was more of a shuffle than a step).

Anywho, back to the main question-

Aside from all that's been worked upon, what aspects of the game franchise's engine still have problems?

I reckon people will only be talking about 3e/3.5 mechanics since to my knowledge 5e didn't fix anything.

In 3e one of the clunkiest things were exclusive skills. I cannot count the number of times that people fucked those up. Getting rid of that designation was a big improvement. Pity they didn't complete the correction by getting rid of class vs. cross-class as well. I'd put skills in the category of things that still have problems. 4e actually did well to let you just pick what skills you are trained in... they just fucked up the execution as with most of their well intended fix attempts.

Having classes grant some number of specific skills to be level-equivalent proficient in in addition to allowing players to pick some number of any skills to be likewise proficient in would be a big improvement.

I'll grant that mostly the problems of Spot/Listen being stupid lay on the Hide/Move Silently part of the equation. Stealth rules need a total overhaul.

Sneak Attack needs a tweak allowing it to work on just about everything beyond the half-assed attempt of introducing the various stupid spells to let Sneak Attack just work as it should.

I don't actually have a problem with most of the combat maneuvers other than that they become harder and harder to do as you level up. If you didn't charge feats or whatever to use them, and fightan man bonuses actually kept up then they'd be fine.

I was okay with subdual damage and didn't know there was a major problem there.

PrC requirements are a problem. Removing them beyond the most generic character class level-based requirement is a solution.

[Judging__Eagle]

Boooooo.

Looks like it was in 3e as well. *chews crow*
I still think it is redundant with cover rules and dumb since a sitting target it easier to hit than a moving target (and people are assumed to be moving) at range or otherwise, but it is definitely in da rules.

I don't suppose someone can explain why cowering gives -2 AC vs ranged attacks whereas sitting or kneeling gives +2. (I get the denial of dexterity bonus, but a +4 difference in AC on top of it vs. ranged seems bizarre)

Ok; so stances:

Normal AC 10
Crouching AC 10 +/- 2 [12 vs Ranged, 8 vs Melee]
Prone AC 10 +/- 4 [14 vs Ranged; 6 vs Melee]

Even if a target is moving; their centre of mass (the place you want to target) is higher and easier to hit; when you get on your knees, your centre of mass is closer to the earth. This lowered target is actually an aspect of ranged combat most people don't know: a lower target will be missed more by a higher target, however the lower target will likely hit the higher target. This is mostly because the human mind doesn't interpret angles as well as it thinks it does.

Exclusive skills are a problem. However making UMD free range is OPAF. Kaelik's skill groups is one direction that I like.

What specific aspects of Move Silently/Hide seem most stupid? [I'm probably going to opt for a single "Perception" skill; like in AS; but I might apply Kaelik's skill groups as a means to codify the background skills in AS]

I'll grant that sneak attack not being able to target critical structures in living machines; or being able to disable things that are little more than corpses is silly. It's actually been a peeve of mine. I'd be more inclined to use something similar to Tome of Necromancy when fighting Undead with the Unliving template; as a way to figure out how to break contructs (likely with the disable device; but also possibly Knowledge (Arcana), as the skill is used to ID golems in the first place).

On subdual damage; I think that people just don't like not killing enemies. Which is really dumb; but the hobby is full of kill-hungry monster mashers.

PrC requirements.. yeah; the lowering of them in [Tome] was a good idea. A Mystic Theurge having to be lvl 6; and 3 caster levels behind in two classes was beyond stupid; making Martial classes have onerous pre-requisites was totally insane.

[maglag]

Even if a target is moving; their centre of mass (the place you want to target) is higher and easier to hit; when you get on your knees, your centre of mass is closer to the earth. This lowered target is actually an aspect of ranged combat most people don't know: a lower target will be missed more by a higher target, however the lower target will likely hit the higher target. This is mostly because the human mind doesn't interpret angles as well as it thinks it does.

That's particularly true when you consider that modern military tactics for infantry are "crouch down and hug that cover damnit".

Screw that "moving people are harder to hit" noise, machine guns have been mowing down infantry charges for decades now.

Somewhat tangent, I hate it when any games include a "supression fire" mechanic.

"Supression fire" is not an offensive effect of the guy with the ranged weapon.

It is an effect of the guy being shot at to increase his survavibility chances.

In the old days there was no "supression fire" nonsense, there was "they tried to charge at our machine gun nest and got all killed". So soldiers started being trained to hug cover when being under heavy fire, instead of keeping their heads up and being riddled with projectiles.

Which leads to, does 3.5e/5e has any rules for moving while prone/crouching? Slower speed to make you less vulnerable to enemy spells?

[Leress]

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/actionsInCombat.htm

Crawling
You can crawl 5 feet as a move action. Crawling incurs attacks of opportunity from any attackers who threaten you at any point of your crawl.

[OgreBattle]

I'd want D&D's size categories interact with crouching/prone stances, so you can go "crouching reduces your size for being shot at from beyond short range by 1, and prone does that by two categories". As for "snakes are always in a prone position", well then maybe we can say they are always in a prone position so they're two categories smaller despite their mass when shooting arrows at them from afar, but when you're in their face stabbing a huge snake is huge sized.

The D&D3e skill list feels overcrowded while the 4e one is too sparse. I'd port over what After Sundown has, which feels like a good balance of flexible but not overwhelming:

.
Skills

No one may ever know if what you did was good or bad, but you did it well.

A key portion of the die roll for any test is the skill. It represents specific training that helps a character perform a task. And because of that, it can lead to a far amount of confusion among some people, because linguistically we refer both to people who are very good at something and also people who are good at a wide variety of things as being “skilled”. In After Sundown, skills are basically confined to the former interpretation. Jacks of All Trades are represented game mechanically by people who have relatively high Attributes and low skills. People with high skills are specialists by definition.

Physical Skills

Physical skills involve doing stuff with your body. Since everyone has a body, the defaulting penalty for using physical skills untrained is zero. Without specialized training you can always still make a raw attribute test. A very strong person can grapple fairly effectively on that basis alone, an intuitive person can easily notice things, and so on and so forth.

Athletics

• Athletics is the skill you use to run, jump, climb, swim, throw things, and generally do everything that you're vaguely expected to do in PE except sneak into the girl's locker room and get shamed by your peers. Most stunts are athletics based, and it can even be useful in attacking enemies in combat by dint of throwing things at specific targets.
  Specializations: Climb, Jump, Run, Swim, Throwing

Combat

• Combat is the training needed to fight. Usually other people. More than any other skill, people will ask to divide up Combat into smaller fragments. It is not immediately clear why, but we strongly suggest that you do not do this. While there are truly a vast array of differences between stabbing someone with a sword and shooting them with a gun – the simple fact that the combat simulationist player can name them all draws attention to how simply not that different they are. The basic truths of combat skill include making rapid life and death decisions while avoiding threats and putting the pointy end of your weapon into the other man. There's a world of differences from combat situation to combat situation, and that's why the skill goes all the way to six. But please remember that this is a game where flying a plane and managing a nuclear power plant can be the same skill (Operations).
  Specializations: By weapon or martial style.

Drive

• Drive allows people to drive culturally appropriate vehicles. For people in the west, that's mostly just cars. But for people in river areas or fishing communities, that's often small boats as well. Driving under safe conditions is such a banal and non-awesome thing, that characters do not need to actually make rolls to do it, so players may not even need the skill. But when it comes to dangerous driving conditions, car chases, or even just cutting commute times, rolls are generally required, and having the skill is helpful. This dichotomy is generally why in movies cars wipe out spectacularly the moment someone uses magic to create icy road conditions – a lot of people on the road are legitimately terrible drivers, and the moment things get harsh they become one of the 18,000 car accidents that happen every day in the US.
  
  A character can drive a new non-standard type of vehicle for every rating point and specialization of the skill they have. Common choices are emergency vehicles, motor boats, construction equipment, armored vehicles, light aircraft, and oversized (semis and buses), but really players can pretty much go nuts. Any plane or ship which is piloted with dials and knobs rather than a wheel or stick is the domain of Operations rather than Drive.
  Specializations: Bad Weather, Aggressive Driving, Cross Town Traffic, Navigation

Larceny

• Characters skilled at Larceny are adept at working outside the law. It is a broad skill that covers lots of dubious activities, from identifying and bypassing security systems to picking other peoples' pockets. There is some overlap between Larceny and Rigging when dealing with locks. Locks are both geared puzzles and a basic hindrance to breaking into places. This is a good skill to have for security workers in addition to criminals. You gotta know your enemy if you're gonna win the war.
  Specializations: Concealing Goods, Legerdemain, Lockpicking, Security Systems

Perception

• Perception is the skill by which a character perceives the world around themselves. It is used to spot clues, notice subtle noises, and smell unfortunate smells. Characters with very low Perceptions are the characters who do not notice monsters sneaking up on them or have to have the meaning or import of subtle clues explained to them by other protagonists.
  Specializations: By sense, Investigation, Noticing sneaking

Stealth

• The Stealth skill is what one uses to avoid being noticed, either by moving quietly, becoming unseen against the background, or simply blending into the crowd. Whenever a character is being searched for, a Stealth check can be used to make that searching more difficult. Stealth involves using what is available, so there is almost no circumstance in which it cannot be used to at least postpone the moment that a character is noticed.
  Specializations: Hiding, Innocuity, Shadowing, Sneaking

Survival

• 100% of the creatures alive today are the descendants of an unbroken line of ancestors who were all able to survive in their environment long enough to have had children that extends back to when single celled organisms had only two different nucleotides in their DNA. So persisting in the face of adversity is something that creatures have a birthright to. And yet, adversity has also kept up with the times. Survival is the skill of keeping up with the elements.
  
  One can also make Survival checks to scavenge things of a more modern nature. A Survival check could be called for to loot useful things out of a junk yard or to track the layout of a sewer system.
  Specializations: Tracking, Gathering, Shelter, by Environment.

Social Skills

Regular socialization is performed with Backgrounds, rather than social skills. If you want to ingratiate yourself with others, track down the word on the street, or otherwise perform social legwork, you probably want to use a background like High Society or Barrio. Social skills apply a -1 dicepool penalty when defaulting.

Animal Ken

• Dealing with inhuman beasts is a skill in and of itself. Neither lions nor sheep really have any backgrounds, and the Animal Ken skill is used in their place. Animal Ken is used to read the emotions of an animal as well as to calm one down or train it to do stuff. Animal Ken is thus your one-stop-shop for all socialization with dogs, which considering how much less a dog knows than any human or supernatural about important plot points, is not nearly as overpowered as you might think
  Specializations: Domestic Animals, Training, Wild Animals, Riding.

Bureaucracy

• Managing logistics and patiently untangling skeins of red tape is the focus of this skill. Characters can understand and manipulate laws, navigate management systems, and correctly formulate formal requests. Bureaucracy is of use whether the character is attempting to perform bureaucratic tasks and of equal utility when confronted by the implacable edifice of a Kafkaesque course. It is not unusual for people to resent bureaucracy, because it is annoying. But as anyone who has done logistics under any circumstances can tell you, not having rules, management, and records in place is even worse.
  Specializations: Business, Government, Logistics

Empathy

• Empathy is our primary means of interpreting the meaning of actions and inactions of other people. It is a trainable sense of how others are feeling given how they look, what they say, and what they do. Empathy is of obvious use to people like lawyers and police, but it is also an important skill for batters in baseball. It is not merely about figuring out whether someone is being truthful when they are talking, but also about determining what someone is about to do in the physical world.
  Specializations: Motivation Determination, Detecting Lies, Action Anticipation

Expression

• Expression is the art of entertaining and changing peoples' minds through art. Lots of people think that this can only be accomplished by making movies about gay cowboys eating pudding, but the truth is that any art that provokes the audience to even acknowledge it is on some level influencing the audience.
  Specializations: Writing, Dance, Music, Oratory

Intimidation

• Intimidation is the art of using fear to get other people to believe or do things desired of them. Intimidation can be explicit (“If you don't do X, I will stab you. In the face.”) or implied (“Did you hear that the feds caught Ted for his tax non-payment? He's going to be doing time.”) and the threats can be to the target's person, finances, or reputation. And some of the best Intimidation is actually phrased in a manner that implies that some third party will do some thing to the target and the Intimidating character is willing to help the target.
  Specializations: Interrogation, Fear Mongering, Skulduggery, Blackmail

Persuasion

• Persuasion is the art of manipulating people in such a manner that it isn't immediately obvious that is what you're doing. People who are skilled at Persuasion are essentially good at lying, although many of them get offended if you call it that. They may prefer the term acting or sales.
  Specializations: Acting, Insinuation, Fast Talk

Tactics

• Tactics is the skill that governs leadership in both the military and corporate sense of the term. Characters can inspire others to give 100% or produce a battle plan. The dragon crawls on its belly, and Tactics dovetails closely with Bureaucracy in the plotting of war, whether genuine or metaphorical. The tactical aspect involves actually maneuvering and the orders necessary to get others to do that – in contrast to the simple appeals to rules or potentially complex logistical management of Bureaucracy.
  Specializations: Inspiration, Maneuvers, Naval, Siege

Technical Skills

Technical skills apply the -1 penalty for defaulting if a character doesn't have an appropriate specialization. That is, a character may have Artisan (Painting), but they will still have to default when welding. A character who becomes trained in any Technical skill gains a specialization for free.

Artisan

• The Artisan skill is used when you want to produce a physical object of some level of workmanship – whether you’re going for aesthetic quality or simple utility.
  
  There are a few more specializations in Artisan than in most Technical skills, in no small part because there are many materials that involve wildly different skills. It is recommended that these specializations are taken as applying to Artisan uses that are “close enough” – so a calligrapher might use the Painting specialization since in both cases they’re applying pigments to surfaces.
  Specializations: By Medium (Painting, Sculpture, Metalwork, Carpentry, etc.)

Electronics

• Electronics is the skill used to make the tools of modernity go. Everything from toasters to computers uses electronics to function. And a character with the electronics skill can figure out how it functions and alter it.
  Specializations: Wiring, Software, Repair, Hacking

Medicine

• Medicine is the art of treating injury and illness to promote good health. Characters use this skill to patch injuries in their pets and team mates. Remember that the realm of horror runs on movie physics, meaning that characters who receive proper medical care are able to make impressive and full recoveries from amazing injuries.
  Specializations: Veterinary, First Aid, Long Term Care, Psychiatric

Operations

• Operations is the skill of making machines and systems go. One part mechanical engineering and one part heavy machinery operation. This is distinct from making machines (generally artisan), running computer programs that make systems go for you (generally electronics), or driving (generally driving). You make an Operations test when there is not a 1:1 correspondence between your muscle movement and the action of the machine. So it's Operations to pilot a boat and Driving to walk a mech around.
  Specializations:Piloting, Industry, Repair

Research

• Knowing things is important, but the fact is that your brain probably can't hold all the information you might possibly want to have available – and doesn't always keep the things you do know readily accessible. When you need information that you don't actually have in your head, you can use the Research skill to go look it up.
  
  Researching things overall is fairly uniform, but there are particular methods of looking things up that might not be obvious to people who don't use that system in particular. Specialization in Archives indicates an ability to look up information in data logs, newspaper histories, and other chronological information stores. The Library specialization involves looking up information in stores classified by content, and Datamining covers sifting through internet searches, wikis, and highly disorganized information for something useful.
  Specializations: Archives, Library, Datamining, Interrogation

Rigging

• Rigging is the skill of MacGyvering and Rube Goldberging things. It is the skill of practical and impromptu engineering. Including lockpicking, plumbing, and clockwork. Rigging is used for most non-electric jury rigging as well as the creation, operation, and repair of most steam punk technologies.
  Specializations: Fluids, Gears, Ropes and Pulleys

Sabotage

• Sabotage is the art of breaking stuff in a manner which will be most effective. Sabotage can be used for “rigging things to explode” rather than the actual Rigging skill. Sabotage can be used to break things in such a way as to make them look not broken, to not break things in such a manner as they do look broken, and to make things break in such a manner as to explode. Remember that events in After Sundown have a pyrotechnics budget, so things tend to explode big.
  Specializations: Explosives, Disabling Stuff, Structural Weaknesses, Traps

Specializations
This is what I'm good at. And I'm the best. You might ask: 'what good is that'? And the answer is that being the best at anything makes you the best at something.

A specialization is a subset of a skill that a character is especially proficient in. When they make tests using the skill in a manner that is relevant to their interests, they gain 2 extra dice in their dice pool. Technical skills are an inherently specialized field, so in addition to getting 2 extra dice within a character's specialties, Technical Skill dicepools are penalized by 1 die if they are being used outside a relevant specialization.

The sample specializations are by no means comprehensive, and players should work out with their MC to find or create specializations that are right for them. A character might have their Sabotage specialized in Eco-Terrorism covering both spiking trees (that might more frequently go under “traps”) and breaking a bulldozer (that might more frequently go under “Disabling Stuff”). Another character might have their Animal Ken specialized in Horses, covering the training, breeding, and calming of wild and domestic horses.

The MC should take care to make sure that no specialization is universally useful. Specializing a skill in something that would apply in all cases is basically the same as just getting 2 points in the skill, and that's unfair. MCs must be expected to reject specializing Combat in “fighting” or specializing Bureaucracy in “paperwork.” A character can have more than one specialization in the same skill, and this is often very important for Technical skills. If more than one Specialization would apply, the character still only gets 2 bonus dice.

Background Skills
You need to have knowledge to get knowledge.

A character's background skills can be literally anything. They represent areas of the game that a character can potentially do legwork in. That is to say that during a chronicle a character may find a clue (such as a strange shape on a video feed from outside a crime scene, a discarded heroin needle, or a tuft of fur), and background skills are methods a character could have to research that clue and gain more information. Background skills are ways for the players to transform story seeds into additional exposition.

Characters can personally know any isolated fact or individual person within the context of the story without there needing to be a notation on the character sheet or die roll involved. You don't need to have a background in evolutionary biology to know that humans are closest related to chimps of all the other great apes – you just need to be told that fact directly or indirectly by someone who does have such a background. But to actually evaluate the research, you need to understand the power and limitations of the methods and the kinds of results that have also been achieved.

Backgrounds are divided into how one interacts with them. Academic Backgrounds are ones in which the character can “go look something up.” They often dovetail nicely with the Research, Perception, or Bureaucracy skills. Sciences, ancient languages, classical art, and so forth make good Academic Backgrounds. Social Backgrounds are ones where the character “goes to talk to some people.” They often dovetail nicely with Social skills like Empathy or Persuasion. Any social group can and does represent a potential Social Background. Occult Backgrounds are ones that involve the character “going to do something secret.” What skills are helpful for this kind of legwork are highly variable, because Occult Backgrounds are a very variable category. Many Occult Backgrounds are literally magical in origin (such as Marduk Society Histories or Tarot Readings), while others are simply secret for a variety of other reasons (legality, morality, or whatever). The defining point of Occult Backgrounds is that telling other people that you have them jeopardizes your ability to use them. The first rule about ghost cartels is the same as the first rule about fight club.

It is frequently important for purposes of socialization whether or not characters have “the same” background or not. Characters who have the same Background automatically have shared interests that they can talk about. However, game mechanically, Backgrounds do not have to have exactly the same name to be “the same.” And two Backgrounds that are “the same” in one instance may be “different” in another. A Background is “the same” if in the current instance it covers essentially the same stuff. If one character had Triads and another character had San Francisco Crime as a Background, the two characters would be on wholly common ground when discussing San Francisco's triad operations, and would be speaking Greek or Martian to each other if the conversation changed to Hong Kong triads or San Francisco's IRA network.

It is up to the MC to determine what constitutes an acceptable Background for the campaign. In general however, it is better to err on the side of Backgrounds that are too useful than ones that are too narrow. While it is overpowered for a character to have a Background that applies in virtually (or actually) all circumstances like “Stuff” or “Trivia”, the worst thing that's going to happen under such a circumstance is that the player is going to roleplay a lot and move the plot forward. That's not fair to the other characters (unless they are doing the same), but that's still better than the players feeling powerless and having the story stagnate.

Sample Backgrounds
Trust me, I've seen stuff like this before.

The completely open ended nature of Backgrounds can be paralyzing when it comes to actual character creation. A blank page can be filled up with anything, but frequently it isn't. So to help with that, here are some examples of backgrounds that some of the characters from the Persona Non Grata chapter have and some descriptions of things they use them for in their chronicles.

Social Backgrounds

• Circus Life: Marionette is a former trapeze artist, and this facet of her life is represented with the Circus Life Background. After hearing the kids talking about the mountain lion they saw, Marionette's player points out that she has actually heard a lot of kids describe lions and tigers, and wishes to reconstruct the real appearance from them. After some leading questions (Intuition + Circus Life), she thinks she knows which Bagheera it was. When she goes to the Cannibal Mimes, she falls back on her circus experiences for Friendly Banter ammunition (Charisma + Circus Life).
  
  Truckin: Jack spends a lot of time on the road and on the radio talkin to other truckers, and this is represented by his Truckin Background. This means that he has an encyclopedic knowledge of rest stops all up and down the 101. So when he gets a time frame for when the van presumably lightened its load, he can make a very accurate guess (Logic + Truckin) about where to start looking for the bodies. When he is listening to someone's description of their journey to Walnut Creek, he notices (Intuition + Truckin) a discrepancy in their story.
  
  Bar Scene: Dean goes out drinking frequently to attempt to forget the hole in his soul, and this justifies his Bar Scene Background. The team needs a decoy, so Dean goes off to the SK8R | to go pick up an extra woman for that purpose (Willpower + Bar Scene). Later on, they need to track down a fishy poker game, so he asks around (Charisma + Bar Scene).

Academic Backgrounds

• Chemistry: Marionette was an accomplished chemist even before her transformation, and thus it is reasonable for her to have the Chemistry background. Looking at the man who died from a Soulless bite, they need to throw the police off the trail. So Marionette throws out a plausible sounding Chemical explanation for the scene cops to eat up and spread as rumor (Willpower + Chemistry). Then when she's looking up the actual poison to produce an antidote, this is very easy for her, because her Background in Chemistry makes her (Logic + Research) test have a very low Threshold.
  
  Cars and Trucks: Jack knows all about things on the roads. So when it comes time to research up the DMV registration on the kidnappers' van, Jack grabs it and gets an answer for certain, because he knows that he is looking for a 2005 Charcoal Dodge Sprinter. But later on, he reaches for something to talk to the guys at Pizza Hog about, and cars seems like as good a topic as any. And since there are some other gear heads, it works out and he uses it as a Friendly Banter (Charisma + Cars and Trucks) platform.
  
  Ballistics: Dean may not seem that bright, but he does know his way around firearms, and this interest is represented by his Ballistics Background. Not only can he talk for hours to gun enthusiasts about caliber and grains, but he can perform the kind of scientific forensic investigation that a ballistics expert might be called upon for. When he picks up the supposed murder weapon, he immediately notices (Intuition + Ballistics) that something is wrong because the armor piercing bullets in the magazine should have exit wounds on the corpse. Later he measures out the probable point of origin from the bullets and gets a fix on the shooter's location (Logic + Ballistics). And when they have the specs on the enchanted rifle and Dean wants to look up what kind of weapon they are dealing with, he just does it because his Background knowledge pushes the Research threshold down to zero.

Occult Backgrounds

• ETA: Marionette spent some time working with the Basque Separatists, as is reflected in her ETA Background. She calls upon a friend of a friend to get some explosives (Charisma + ETA), and when the report of the “terrorist attack” on the clinic comes out, she is able to go through the details and identify it as a feint (Logic + ETA) because she knows how terrorist attacks work.
  
  Chinese Monsters: Jack has put up with a lot of bullshit from the Eastern wing of the Shattered Empire, and he knows his long haired ghosts from his thundering witches. During the investigations, he meets up with The Peach Lady, and needing something to talk about, he reaches for supernatural stuff from her homeland. This is an acceptable form of Friendly Banter (Charisma + Chinese Monsters), and seemingly gets the immortal beauty to open up to him. Later on, he comes face to face with an Asian Leviathan and identifies it as such (Logic + Chinese Monsters).
  
  Hell Mouths: Dean has been in and out of the Dark Reflection many times, and this is reflected in his Hell Mouths Background. As they are searching the house, Dean notices (Intuition + Hell Mouths) that the bathroom mirror has been used as a portal, and fairly recently by the ashen smell. When the team finds itself outside the Iron Tower, Dean falls on his knowledge of hell mouth locations to plan a route back to the mortal world (Logic + Hell Mouths).

Some skills like 'combat' would be removed or D&D would have to be reworked somewhat to include it. Electronics becomes 'arcana'. Include specialization so you can have one Athletics guy be a super swimmer and the other one is a super climber but both are basically competent in what the other does.

As D&D is already a level based system where if you don't keep your skills topped up they fall behind level appropriate challenges, what reason is there to use skill points instead of skill proficiencies?

How about removing hitpoints and having hitboxes instead? As D&D loves to throw tiny fey and giant demons at adventurers who also have access to shrinking and enlargement, tracking hitboxes seems a lot more efficient than adjusting hitpoints. Hitboxes also let level 0 townsfolk interact with house
cats and the house cats interact with mice in a sane manner.


----

In D&D combat ogre will never knock a town guard over with his club UNLESS the ogre is specifically using a combat maneuver. Like you can have 10 hp and take 9 from an ogre's swing, but by the rules that devastating blow doesn't budge you a ft. Shoot the only time that happens is if you're a Rogue and took a high level special ability to roll with impact. Those kinds of things should be integrated into the core rules so a level 0 commoner can send a cat flying with a blow from his broom in a similar manner to a knight getting knocked across the floor when the adult red dragon swipes at him.

How to do that in a clean and efficient manner though I'm not too sure.

"stomping" should also be a natural part of the combat rules as a way to fight smaller opponents and not be an (ex) ability of elephants. A human should be able to stomp attack some rats in the same manner as a cloud giant plowing through a party of humans.

[GâtFromKI]

-Stealth & Perception (Most people don't seem to know that there are Distance Mods to Perception; or that variable speeds can be used with penalties/bonuses to stealth checks)

The people I know know it, but they also know it doesn't work when you run the numbers. Using the rules as written, nobody can spot anything at 300 feet (the penalty is -30. On a d20), the game plays more like Baldur's gate with its fog of war than an actual RPG. And there's no way anyone can see the sun.

So the people I know know that rule, but don't use it because it gives stupid results.

[Username17]

The 3e spot distance modifiers are unparseable and every possible reading is bad. The DC shits by 1 for every 10 feet, but depending on which part of the rules you read the zero point is anywhere from the square next to you to several hundred feet away. So spotting someone at the limits of spellcasting distance on an open plain is either impossible or something you can't fail at depending on which chart you're looking at, but in any case 10 feet per pip on the die is something that pushes off the RNG way too fast in both directions. The entire RNG is just over half a football field and that's insane.

3rd edition Stealth rules were incomplete and contradictory. It was a legit problem with the system, and people mostly ended up doing half assed rules hacks on the fly. Fixing them to be complete and satisfactory as written would be hard. And once the 5e design team realized that, they just left the rules part unwritten.

-Username17

[violence in the media]

In D&D combat ogre will never knock a town guard over with his club UNLESS the ogre is specifically using a combat maneuver. Like you can have 10 hp and take 9 from an ogre's swing, but by the rules that devastating blow doesn't budge you a ft. Shoot the only time that happens is if you're a Rogue and took a high level special ability to roll with impact. Those kinds of things should be integrated into the core rules so a level 0 commoner can send a cat flying with a blow from his broom in a similar manner to a knight getting knocked across the floor when the adult red dragon swipes at him.

How to do that in a clean and efficient manner though I'm not too sure.

"stomping" should also be a natural part of the combat rules as a way to fight smaller opponents and not be an (ex) ability of elephants. A human should be able to stomp attack some rats in the same manner as a cloud giant plowing through a party of humans.

I agree with this, but should shooing a cat with a broom operate the same as Sauron launching elves with his mace?

Bigger creatures, in general, should just shove smaller creatures around the battlefield (or prompt them to move) as an incidental side effect to whatever they're doing. Trampling, for example, shouldn't be a full round action and should just be a side effect of a creature using a move action over something 1 size smaller than itself. Similar to that, it seems weird that you generally can't barrel past someone with an Overrun action AND then do something else in that same round.

Being able to resist being shoved around like this should be an express ability or gear-dependent though, and not a procedural ability generated by strength score or BAB or d20 roll or whatever. So being able to stand in the path of something and say "It doesn't move/damage me" is a result of having an explicit special ability or a pike (that gives you an explicit rule ). If you're a wizard that winds up with a 30 Str, or a peasant that has a +7 BAB, you're still getting tossed around.

[maglag]

The 3e spot distance modifiers are unparseable and every possible reading is bad. The DC shits by 1 for every 10 feet, but depending on which part of the rules you read the zero point is anywhere from the square next to you to several hundred feet away. So spotting someone at the limits of spellcasting distance on an open plain is either impossible or something you can't fail at depending on which chart you're looking at, but in any case 10 feet per pip on the die is something that pushes off the RNG way too fast in both directions. The entire RNG is just over half a football field and that's insane.

The Spot skill is used primarily to detect characters or creatures who are hiding. Typically, your Spot check is opposed by the Hide check of the creature trying not to be seen.

You need cover or concealment in order to attempt a Hide check.

Thus, in the case of an open field with no cover nor concealment available, there is no need for roll, you automatically succeed on your spot check.

Like you don't need a climb check to walk over a plain surface or go up some stairs, nor you need a balance check to remain in your feet over stable firm ground.

[Mechalich]

Thus, in the case of an open field with no cover nor concealment available, there is no need for roll, you automatically succeed on your spot check.

The average open field, for considerable portions of the year, has either grass or crops at least 1 foot in height and often much higher. There's concealment everywhere and yet someone or something in motion is actually surprisingly easy to spot at rather large distances if the ground is level. That's why you can practically stumble over deer fawns sleeping in fields but spot a walking adult at hundreds of yards.

'I want to fireball that thing running through the grass over there' is a totally viable move and exactly the kind of thing that runs up against the RNG limits hard.

[Orca]

I've played games with a knockback/down roll on every hit and it slows things down to no real use most of the time. I don't recommend it. If it's an option to make a simple tradeoff to get such a roll - trading some attack bonus or damage - I can see it being used occasionally.

[maglag]

Thus, in the case of an open field with no cover nor concealment available, there is no need for roll, you automatically succeed on your spot check.

The average open field, for considerable portions of the year, has either grass or crops at least 1 foot in height and often much higher. There's concealment everywhere and yet someone or something in motion is actually surprisingly easy to spot at rather large distances if the ground is level.

Well, if you want to rule that 1 feet tall grass grants concealment, that's up to you. I guess nobody will ever get an Aoo or sneak attacks in your games, since concealment does deny those.

But running/charging does gives you a big -20 penalty to hide checks.

That's why you can practically stumble over deer fawns sleeping in fields but spot a walking adult at hundreds of yards.

'I want to fireball that thing running through the grass over there' is a totally viable move and exactly the kind of thing that runs up against the RNG limits hard.

Make up your mind. You can't have both "large creatures can 100% hide until you stumble in them with just 1 feet of grass" and "100% precise long-range artillery against medium sized lone targets hundreds of yards away at level 5".

[Mechalich]

Well, if you want to rule that 1 feet tall grass grants concealment, that's up to you. I guess nobody will ever get an Aoo or sneak attacks in your games, since concealment does deny those.

You said a field has 'no concealment available' if you drop prone in grass that's a foot high you're going to be reasonably concealed. I have stumbled over sleeping fawns in mid-grass prairie, this is a thing that happens.

Make up your mind. You can't have both "large creatures can 100% hide until you stumble in them with just 1 feet of grass" and "100% precise long-range artillery against medium sized lone targets hundreds of yards away at level 5".

No, its two different points. One, it is absolutely possible to conceal yourself in an 'open' field, since an open field isn't a lawn or a golf course a very large percentage of the time. Two, a person standing in tall grass or walking steadily in tall grass would have concealment and make a hide check, but you could still see them from a very considerable distance, certainly equal to the 600 ft. range of a level 5 fireball. Except, at that distance, you apparently have a -60 penalty to spot to notice them, so the rules claim you can't.

Essentially the 10 ft increment makes stealth situations utterly impossible to parse outside of shrunken dungeon distances, which of course is one of the more common failure points for D&D rules of all systems.

[Username17]

Thus, in the case of an open field with no cover nor concealment available, there is no need for roll, you automatically succeed on your spot check.

As I said earlier, the books are flat inconsistent on that point. According to the Wilderness section, the spot DC to see an opponent on an open plain is 20 at 6d6x40 feet. Finding a piece of text that unambiguously says one thing doesn't help your case that it works any particular way, because the rules are inconsistent and contradictory.

The rules for sneaking and scouting are bad in 3rd edition. But more importantly, they are different in different parts of the rules and bad in different ways. And that's just the core rules. If you throw in expansion rules, there are stealth nerfs and incompatible declarations to both sneaking and scouting all over the fucking place.

-Username17

[maglag]

Thus, in the case of an open field with no cover nor concealment available, there is no need for roll, you automatically succeed on your spot check.

As I said earlier, the books are flat inconsistent on that point. According to the Wilderness section, the spot DC to see an opponent on an open plain is 20 at 6d6x40 feet. Finding a piece of text that unambiguously says one thing doesn't help your case that it works any particular way, because the rules are inconsistent and contradictory.

The rules for sneaking and scouting are bad in 3rd edition. But more importantly, they are different in different parts of the rules and bad in different ways. And that's just the core rules. If you throw in expansion rules, there are stealth nerfs and incompatible declarations to both sneaking and scouting all over the fucking place.

-Username17

I don't have the books with me right now, but in the srd what it says is

"In plains terrain, the maximum distance at which a Spot check for detecting the nearby presence of others can succeed is 6d6×40 feet"

No mention to any DC 20. Those rules are not incompatible with the spot/hide rules found in the skills section. The srd Wilderness section simply adds a cap to how far away you can spot someone based on the terrain, it doesn't overwrite any DCs.

So either you're misrembering, or the core rules were errata'd.

[GâtFromKI]

The Spot skill is used primarily to detect characters or creatures who are hiding. Typically, your Spot check is opposed by the Hide check of the creature trying not to be seen.

Oh please.


On this image you automatically spot the sun.


And now you can't possibly spot the sun.

It's stupid and you know it.

[Username17]

If you can't find the base DC 20 in the SRD, I don't actually give a shit. Firstly, because it's you not finding something in an electronic document that is hacked up into little pieces and no longer maintained by a central authority, and secondly because it doesn't matter. You found the part where it says that you get a spot check at 6d6x40 feet, and you didn't find the part where it says what the base DC is at that point. Since the +1 per 10 feet would add eighty four to the DC for anything that far away, if there isn't a rule that sets the DC to some more plausible number at that range, spotting people on an open plain is basically impossible. If the SRD actually omitted a rule (which I lack the give-a-shit to sort through all the different SRD pages to verify), it was the rule that makes long distance visibility possible.

-Username17

[Koumei]

On this image you automatically spot the sun.

Don't be silly, it's much too far away to possibly see.

[GâtFromKI]

On this image you automatically spot the sun.

Don't be silly, it's much too far away to possibly see.

According to Maglag, you automatically spot it because you don't have to roll if nothing's hampering your vision. But if anything forces you to roll (like a cloud), it's an auto-fail indeed.


Now look at this image :

According to Maglag, any character is able to spot the remains of the Apollo mission - there's no concealment or anything involved. If you can't spot it, it's the proof that nobody ever landed on the Moon. Coincidence ? I think not.