automatic fail/success

[BIGMamaSloth]

I'm in a bit of a squabble with some of my friends over whether or not a natural 1 always failing and a natural 20 always succeeding was only on saves and attack rolls. I took the side that it was only saves and attack rolls, am I right? if so can I get a page number to back it up?

[Big Fau]

I'm in a bit of a squabble with some of my friends over whether or not a natural 1 always failing and a natural 20 always succeeding was only on saves and attack rolls. I took the side that it was only saves and attack rolls, am I right? if so can I get a page number to back it up?

PHB Combat chapter:



A natural 1 (the d20 comes up 1) on an attack roll is always a miss. A natural 20 (the d20 comes up 20) is always a hit. A natural 20 is also a threat—a possible critical hit.



A natural 1 (the d20 comes up 1) on a saving throw is always a failure (and may cause damage to exposed items; see Items Surviving after a Saving Throw). A natural 20 (the d20 comes up 20) is always a success.

[Zombimode]

You are right.
Its here in the SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/skills/usingSkills.htm#skillChecks) under "skill checks".
Any other rolls on a d20 that one could succeed or fail are ability checks and those are treated as skill checks.
So yeah, only saving throws and attack rolls can automaticly fail or succeed.

[flumphy]

That is, of course, RAW. Every DM I have ever played with but one (and since I do PbP, that's alot) has houseruled that the natural 20/natural 1 rules apply to all checks. It's just more fun that way, in my opinion, since seeing those numbers show up and be "wasted" is anticlimactic.

[Ravens_cry]

I personally disagree with this houserule. Does an Olympic acrobat fail their most basic routine about 1 in 20 times? Can you Jump to the moon if you try enough times?
That's what this houserule can do.

[Divide by Zero]

How about a house rule where instead of automatic success or failure, you instead reroll with a +20/-20 modifier (if you roll it again, they stack)? Similar to how you get rolls higher than 6 in Shadowrun. That way, you're not stuck with a flat 5% chance, and you can never get your modifier so high or so low that it's physically impossible to fail/succeed.

[Gavinfoxx]

If DMs would rule that natural 1 / natural 20 applies to skill checks, I would just take 10 as much as possible.

Hell, I'd take 10 as much as possible ANYWAY.

[hobbitkniver]

I personally disagree with this houserule. Does an Olympic acrobat fail their most basic routine about 1 in 20 times? Can you Jump to the moon if you try enough times?
That's what this houserule can do.

I agree, my old DM used to make 1's do terrible things to your character. I rolled a natural 1 twice and ended up shooting 2 arrows; almost killing our wizard who was behind me. I just don't see how a well trained archer could screw up that much without special circumstances.

[Big Fau]

That is, of course, RAW. Every DM I have ever played with but one (and since I do PbP, that's alot) has houseruled that the natural 20/natural 1 rules apply to all checks. It's just more fun that way, in my opinion, since seeing those numbers show up and be "wasted" is anticlimactic.

I'm going to disagree with that part ad leave it at that. This thing has been debated to death and back, and I really do not want to start it up again.

[Jeraa]

That is, of course, RAW. Every DM I have ever played with but one (and since I do PbP, that's alot) has houseruled that the natural 20/natural 1 rules apply to all checks. It's just more fun that way, in my opinion, since seeing those numbers show up and be "wasted" is anticlimactic.

So you are fine with everyone being able to swim up waterfalls, balance on top of the water, and being able to squeeze through holes the size of their head if they just try enough times? Because all of those are uses for skills in the Epic Level Handbook, and by allowing the automatic success on a 20, every single person (including 1st level commoners) can do those things if they just try enough times.

Or the best blacksmith in the universe failing to make a simple knife 1 in 20 times?

Applying the automatic failure/success rules to skill checks is just stupid.

[Groverfield]

So you are fine with everyone being able to swim up waterfalls, balance on top of the water, and being able to squeeze through holes the size of their head if they just try enough times? Because all of those are uses for skills in the Epic Level Handbook, and by allowing the automatic success on a 20, every single person (including 1st level commoners) can do those things if they just try enough times.
Thousand monkeys rule

Or the best blacksmith in the universe failing to make a simple knife 1 in 20 times?
The worst offday, however if there's some curse on or a deity of the forge being jealous of the smith.

Applying the automatic failure/success rules to skill checks is just stupid.

Agreed, but if there's a d% (or d1000) rule after a natural 1 or natural 20 confirmed only 1%(00 showing) of the time that something epic happens when there's normally almost no chance of it happening the two above examples... but that would be a houserule. Two 1's and two 20's in a row happen far too often at my tables for the normal epic blunder or epic/auto success to work.

[Xtomjames]

Well with most skill checks you have to declare what you're doing before you roll. So the whole over exaggeration of what a nat 20 or nat 1 does if applied to skills isn't valid. If you're to declaire I'm going to swim up the waterfall, the DM should say it's impossible unless there is a valid reason that it is in fact possible. Because of the limitations in jump, jumping over the moon is impossible in all accounts.

However I disagree with the Nat 1 and 20 being applied to skills. I believe it unbalances the game. With nat 1 and nat 20 being applied to skill checks a little old lady with poor eyesight could potentially see my rogue that has a +15 to his hide. (This has actually happened to me in a game where the nat 1 and 20 rule is applied across the board.) What is worse is that they've not compensated for taking 10 or taking 20 against nat 20 roles. So even if my rogue were to take 20 (which to be fair should be the equivalent of rolling a 20) and the old lady were to roll a natural 20, the nat 20 still beats the taking 20 action.

[Curmudgeon]

Well with most skill checks you have to declare what you're doing before you roll. So the whole over exaggeration of what a nat 20 or nat 1 does if applied to skills isn't valid. If you're to declaire I'm going to swim up the waterfall, the DM should say it's impossible unless there is a valid reason that it is in fact possible.
Swimming up a waterfall is definitely possible in D&D; it's DC 80 (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/skills.htm#swim) on your Swim check. Enough ranks and magical buffs can make that doable well before you get to Epic levels.

[Jeraa]

Well with most skill checks you have to declare what you're doing before you roll. So the whole over exaggeration of what a nat 20 or nat 1 does if applied to skills isn't valid. If you're to declaire I'm going to swim up the waterfall, the DM should say it's impossible unless there is a valid reason that it is in fact possible. Because of the limitations in jump, jumping over the moon is impossible in all accounts.


Those three things I mentioned (swimming up a waterfall, squeezing through a 6 inch hole, and balancing on water) are all valid uses of a skill. They can be found in the Epic Level Handbook, so it isn't like I was coming up with something totally out of nowhere.

But if you don't like the epic skill uses, how about something from the Players Handbook. Getting out of masterwork manacles is a DC 35 check, while normal manacles is a DC 30. If a natural 20 is allowed to be an automatic success, then anyone, even the town drunk, can escape from the best made manacles. The hardest lock is a DC 25 to pick (Granted, Open Lock is a Trained only skill, so this does put a limit on it). That means, with just a bit of time, anyone can break out of prison. Even the Int 3 town idiot.

It also means, that 5% of the time, anyone can possibly hear an owl gliding in for the kill , while on the other side of a stone wall (DC 45). Even the worst performer could, in 1 out of 20 performances, perform so well as to "draw attention from distant potential patrons, or even extraplanar beings.".

And if you allow a natural 1 to be an automatic failure, it means that anyone can fail to hear a battle going on in the next room through an open door (DC -10), the worlds most experienced and knowledgeable tracker & guide can't find food for himself in a forest (DC 10), or the worlds best Boy Scout can't tie a knot (DC 10).

A master blacksmith should not fail at making a simple spoon 5% of the time. He could indeed fail, but not as often as 1 time in 20.

Edit: Oh yeah, forgot that one. Another use of Escape Artist is to walk through a Wall of Force (DC 120). If automatic successes are allowed, anyone can walk through a Wall of Force if they just try enough times. And anyone can animate a rope in their hands as if by the Animate Rope spell (DC 80 Use Rope) if they just try hard enough.

Yeah, I know some of my examples are extreme. But all of what I said is possible by RAW, and should not be something the typical commoner could do just by trying for a while.

[flumphy]

So you are fine with everyone being able to swim up waterfalls, balance on top of the water, and being able to squeeze through holes the size of their head if they just try enough times? Because all of those are uses for skills in the Epic Level Handbook, and by allowing the automatic success on a 20, every single person (including 1st level commoners) can do those things if they just try enough times.

Or the best blacksmith in the universe failing to make a simple knife 1 in 20 times?

Applying the automatic failure/success rules to skill checks is just stupid.

If there's no reasonable chance of failure (or there's time to take 10), then there's no need for a roll. And if there's absolutely no chance of success, then the player shouldn't be allowed to roll.

I understand some people are uncomfortable with that level of DM fiat, especially in groups with a more old-school player-vs.-DM dynamic. And that's cool. I never denied what the rules actually say. I was just pointing out that the house rule was, for better or for worse, extremely common, and why that is the case. Perhaps I should have specified "more fun for me."

Also, it's not like the skill system is exactly a perfect model of how things work to begin with. For things like diplomacy, a mandatory 5% failure would probably be MORE realistic.



Yeah, I know some of my examples are extreme. But all of what I said is possible by RAW, and should not be something the typical commoner could do just by trying for a while.

Again, I'm not denying that at all. But if you're sticking to RAW that strictly, then you're probably not houseruling much in the first place.

[Gavinfoxx]

Actually, taking 10 takes exactly as long as rolling. You only can't take 10 when you are in stress like in combat, and in a few specific skills or situations that are specifically called out where one cannot take 10.

[GoodbyeSoberDay]

Swimming up a waterfall is definitely possible in D&D; it's DC 80 (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/skills.htm#swim) on your Swim check. Enough ranks and magical buffs can make that doable well before you get to Epic levels.But we're talking about untrained, 10 strength human commoners succeeding about one time in twenty.

Now, if you add in the caveat that otherwise-impossible or otherwise-trivial skill checks aren't rolled, the houserule only affects opposed rolls. It means, specifically, that the probability your super strong fighter* will be pushed off a cliff by a kobold* given the kobold is trying to do so is 1 in 20 instead of 1 in 400. Now, is it anticlimactic for the 1 to just add 1 to the roll, or is it anticlimactic for mister mid-level fighter to get pushed off a cliff by a lone kobold, assuming it's not a comedy-oriented campaign?

*Given the fighter has, say, +13 bull rush to the kobold's -5, this means that if the kobold rolls a 2 for a total of -3 to the check, he will still succeed if the fighter rolls a 1, because apparently the skilled, bull-rushing fighter trips on his shoelaces about one in twenty times anyone tries to mess with him.