Perception is the king of skills

[LucianoAr]

Seriously, i havent seen ANY skill been rolled as much as perception, i try to have it in all of my characters and i feel naked without it.

however, no background gives you that skill, and, other than half elf, you cant get it from race, leaving many classes without the option.

is there any way around that? i want perception everywhere!

[Shining Wrath]

All varieties of elf grant Perception proficiency. It's one of the cool things about the pointy-eared folk.

AFB but I think it's possible to get Perception as a class skill from several classes.

[Laserlight]

Seriously, i havent seen ANY skill been rolled as much as perception, i try to have it in all of my characters and i feel naked without it.

however, no background gives you that skill, and, other than half elf, you cant get it from race, leaving many classes without the option.

is there any way around that? i want perception everywhere!

The frequency is a DM-dependent thing. At our table, we're a lot more likely to want Diplomacy or Nature than Perception,

As far as how you get it--PHB p 125 says that the background features can be customized, and that you can pick any two skills that suit your character.

[Naanomi]

however, no background gives you that skill, and, other than half elf, you cant get it from race, leaving many classes without the option.
Elves of all stripes, half-elves, and humans can use racial skills to get it;
Sailor/Pirate background gives it
Any other background can 'double down' on a proficiency (getting it from class and background) to choose one of their choice instead... generally how I get perception on my sheet: a reward for taking a background that matches my class.

[JFahy]

The frequency is a DM-dependent thing. At our table, we're a lot more likely to want Diplomacy or Nature than Perception,

As far as how you get it--PHB p 125 says that the background features can be customized, and that you can pick any two skills that suit your character.

My players roll perception a ton, and I know that's not good. Laserlight's post reminds me that I should be looking for excuses to call for something more specialized if it's a better fit than perception. (One of my beliefs about games is that if there's an option that everybody always takes, it's not much of an option and should maybe be designed differently.)

[DanyBallon]

As an option, downtime can be used to train in new skills. Ask your DM if he would allow it in his game.

[BRC]

One thing about perception is that usually the entire party is rolling it, and if any of them succeed, they basically all benefit. So unless you're planning to go scout ahead alone, it isn't as important for any individual member to have good Perception.

It's certainly useful, but its not as crucial because you can usually count on the sheer number of D20s being rolled to make it likely that somebody is going to roll well enough.

[Theodoxus]

Perception's been king since 3.0 - and earlier, though called different things.

Anything that lets you clue into what's happening around you will always be preferred. Though I have a few players who don't care and simply react to whatever happens to bump into them. Born followers, that lot.

[Slipperychicken]

One thing about perception is that usually the entire party is rolling it, and if any of them succeed, they basically all benefit. So unless you're planning to go scout ahead alone, it isn't as important for any individual member to have good Perception.

It's certainly useful, but its not as crucial because you can usually count on the sheer number of D20s being rolled to make it likely that somebody is going to roll well enough.

While this is pretty much entirely true, I feel it necessary to note that it changes completely if the DM calls for passive perception instead. In that case, you would want at least one party member with a very high modifier (Rogues and Bards are good candidates because they can get Expertise in it), and other party members not to invest in it.

[Mandragola]

One thing about perception is that usually the entire party is rolling it, and if any of them succeed, they basically all benefit. So unless you're planning to go scout ahead alone, it isn't as important for any individual member to have good Perception.

It's certainly useful, but its not as crucial because you can usually count on the sheer number of D20s being rolled to make it likely that somebody is going to roll well enough.

Where that's not true is in the case of surprise. People who didn't make their perception check don't get a turn.

It is the king of skills though, as others have noted. I wonder if it was better when it was listen and spot, so you needed two things. I suppose at least they've split out investigate.

Every character out of 6 in a party I'm in has stealth (fighter, monk, rogue, warlock, bard and ranger) and most have perecption. Nobody planned it that way but that's how it happened. My shadow monk can even put pass without trace on the group, to make doubly sure. We get quite a lot of surprise rounds!

[JFahy]

One thing about perception is that usually the entire party is rolling it, and if any of them succeed, they basically all benefit. So unless you're planning to go scout ahead alone, it isn't as important for any individual member to have good Perception.

It's certainly useful, but its not as crucial because you can usually count on the sheer number of D20s being rolled to make it likely that somebody is going to roll well enough.

Group rolls do a decent job of fixing that, if you don't want
"large groups see everything" to occur. They're hard to
rationalize for perception, but I don't mind because I like
their overall effect.

[jkat718]

Group rolls do a decent job of fixing that, if you don't want
"large groups see everything" to occur. They're hard to
rationalize for perception, but I don't mind because I like
their overall effect.

I never considered that side effect of group checks. I always thought if it as "if half the group succeeds, the entire group does." I guess I missed the bit where, even if you--as part of that group--succeed, the entire group fails, not just those who failed. Interesting... :smallamused:

EDIT: This means that the Cleric in my players' party, with his extra-high Perception, will no longer see all the hidden doors I put in a dungeon, because no one else boosted WIS.

[Malifice]

Half elves, elves and (if they want it) variant humans all get it.

Also; if your class and background give you the same skill, you can pick any other skill that you want:


Each background gives a character proficiency in two
skills. Skills are described in chapter 7.
In addition, most backgrounds give a character
proficiency with one or more tools. Tools and tool
proficiencies are detailed in chapter 5.
If a character would gain the same proficiency from
two different sources, he or she can choose a different
proficiency of the same kind (skill or tool) instead.

That includes perception.

[Balor777]

My players roll perception a ton, and I know that's not good. Laserlight's post reminds me that I should be looking for excuses to call for something more specialized if it's a better fit than perception. (One of my beliefs about games is that if there's an option that everybody always takes, it's not much of an option and should maybe be designed differently.)

Yeah but they should know they ar erolling right?
I mean you do the rolls.Right?

[JFahy]

Yeah but they should know they ar erolling right?
I mean you do the rolls.Right?

I try not to take away my players' dice too much, but I often do for Perception and Stealth.
Calling for a Perception check, and having the player roll a 1, is a good way to get whatever
room they're standing in completely dismantled. :smalltongue:

[JFahy]

I never considered that side effect of group checks. I always thought if it as "if half the group succeeds, the entire group does." I guess I missed the bit where, even if you--as part of that group--succeed, the entire group fails, not just those who failed. Interesting... :smallamused:

EDIT: This means that the Cleric in my players' party, with his extra-high Perception, will no longer see all the hidden doors I put in a dungeon, because no one else boosted WIS.

Like I say, a little hard to justify, but it leads to some interesting behaviors.
The ranger wants to scout ahead, alone, because then he can solo
the Perception checks. Sherlock Holmes gets annoyed when the police
show up because he doesn't want to group-roll Investigation with a
bunch of amateurs. You consider hiring a couple guides when traveling
in the winter, not so they can fight but so they can help your group make
Survival checks.

I think that's kinda neat. :smallsmile:

[Yagyujubei]

TL;DR many of the posts, but if it hasn't been stated, your background can have whichever skills you want. It says it in the PHB right at the start of the section, that you can pick whichever skills you want so as to avoid overlap with class skills etc.

also, just a little anecdote of annoyance, I took observant as part of the theme of my character so my passive perception is 23 now, and my DM never fricking remembers, and always has me roll perception which is almost always lower than my passive due to the bonus.

seriously, there are always these situations where he'll be like "ok roll perception" to find out some crucial detail to the situation were in 10 minutes AFTER i should have noticed it with my passive perception. it's driving me crazy

[JFahy]

seriously, there are always these situations where he'll be like "ok roll perception" to find out some crucial detail to the situation were in 10 minutes AFTER i should have noticed it with my passive perception. it's driving me crazy

Man, that's backwards. We feed the players opportunities to use their
shiny new feats...don't we? Isn't that a thing? :smalleek:

[Once a Fool]

I think using group checks for perception is a stellar idea! Consider it yoinked!

[Mandragola]

I really don't think perception is intended as a group check. They actually give rules for when some characters are spot a monster and others don't: some people are surprised. If it's a secret door then one person spotting it should be enough.

On the other hand I don't think stealth or many athletics rolls should be group checks. Climbing when roped together makes sense as a group check. Jumping over a chasm or moving quietly doesn't. No matter how quiet the rogue is he can't make the paladin stop rattling and banging into stuff.

[Demonic Spoon]

also, just a little anecdote of annoyance, I took observant as part of the theme of my character so my passive perception is 23 now, and my DM never fricking remembers, and always has me roll perception which is almost always lower than my passive due to the bonus.


There is no RAW for when you use passive perception over regular perception other than the stealth rules. Aside from that, passive perception follows the rules of any other passive check, which means it takes effect whenever the DM wants the convenience of passive checks. Of course, I'm sure that not knowing whether or not your passive perception will be useful for anything at all is very much fun for you, either.

For what it's worth, in my game, I just banned Observant and let a player who took it take a new feat and re-tweak his point buy to compensate, and it's much easier on everyone.

[JFahy]

On the other hand I don't think stealth or many athletics rolls should be group checks. Climbing when roped together makes sense as a group check. Jumping over a chasm or moving quietly doesn't. No matter how quiet the rogue is he can't make the paladin stop rattling and banging into stuff.

Glad you bring this up - I had someone do exactly this with me once, when I was a new trooper in my reserve regiment. One of the sergeants went over my gear, adjusted some stuff ('take this off, fill this up so it doesn't slosh, tape this down') and then they kept an eye on me while we patrolled. Step here, don't step here, lie down on your own shadow when a flare goes off...

...that could work in a lot of cases. Of course, you insert at least one spot where the rogue's busy, or they're so close to someone that he can't even whisper, and the paladin has to make one check on his own or a mini-crisis happens. :smallsmile:

[Demonic Spoon]

The point of group checks isn't necessarily to represent the skilled people helping those who aren't; it's also a good way to reduce randomness.

If you have a 4 person party all rolling stealth checks individually, even if they all have good Stealth modifiers, someone's going to roll poorly and get the group spotted. You shouldn't even try to sneak with multiple people if you're rolling individually.

[Person_Man]

Yup. It's a basic and normal part of any hidden map exploration game.

I've often felt that Initiative should be moved out of Dexterity and over to Wisdom (because its basically Perception, intuition, etc), and mental Saves should be moved to Intelligence (memory, deduction, mental fortitude, etc). That would balance things out a bit, at least. As it stands now, Perception AND mental Saves makes Wisdom the most worthwhile mental stat, just as Dex is the most worthwhile physical stat.

[Doug Lampert]

Group rolls do a decent job of fixing that, if you don't want
"large groups see everything" to occur. They're hard to
rationalize for perception, but I don't mind because I like
their overall effect.

How is this hard to justify? You're part of a group, all those other people are DISTRACTIONS from your perception check.

What do I hear? "Well, John's character is breathing, and Jill's is stepping on a twig, and Fred's is being very quiet buy you can catch the motion out of the corner of your eye, and..."

The MAIN way groups are more alert than individuals is if they divide up what different people are looking for or what areas they are watching, and the instant you do that one or two guys missing the check can in fact mean the whole group misses spotting something.

[JFahy]

How is this hard to justify? You're part of a group, all those other people are DISTRACTIONS from your perception check.

What do I hear? "Well, John's character is breathing, and Jill's is stepping on a twig, and Fred's is being very quiet buy you can catch the motion out of the corner of your eye, and..."


Distraction is the best justification I can think of, yeah. Makes all kinds
of sense for 'hear the other party while traveling along the road' checks,
not quite as much for 'notice that the suit of armor by the fireplace has
started moving' checks.

Of course, the latter you can handle by going to individual checks to see
who's surprised when the mayhem starts, so maybe that's not as much
of a problem.

[Doug Lampert]

Distraction is the best justification I can think of, yeah. Makes all kinds
of sense for 'hear the other party while traveling along the road' checks,
not quite as much for 'notice that the suit of armor by the fireplace has
started moving' checks.

Of course, the latter you can handle by going to individual checks to see
who's surprised when the mayhem starts, so maybe that's not as much
of a problem.

Even for "see the armor moving", you catch LOTS of motion out of the corner of your eye and IGNORE it if you know there are lots of other people around.

[Mandragola]

Glad you bring this up - I had someone do exactly this with me once, when I was a new trooper in my reserve regiment. One of the sergeants went over my gear, adjusted some stuff ('take this off, fill this up so it doesn't slosh, tape this down') and then they kept an eye on me while we patrolled. Step here, don't step here, lie down on your own shadow when a flare goes off...

...that could work in a lot of cases. Of course, you insert at least one spot where the rogue's busy, or they're so close to someone that he can't even whisper, and the paladin has to make one check on his own or a mini-crisis happens. :smallsmile:

Ok that's a cool bit of real world experience that I can't dispute. But were you wearing full plate armour, carrying a shield and did you have a greatsword on your back? Also, was your dexterity score 8 and were you untrained in stealth? :)

Just to be picky on rules for a second, I think that what your squad-mates did for you was more like an assist action than a group check. They helped you so that you didn't screw up. I'd be totally cool with having the rogue assist the paladin with his stealth roll, but then I'd make him roll it himself. Maybe the paladin could then give the cleric some advice on jumping over the chasm, but what he couldn't do is jump over it for him.

But on the other hand, no I don't really buy the idea of one perceptive character failing to spot something just because he happens to be going around with a blind guy. I mean sure if the bard is singing and the barbarian is raging then it will be harder to hear stuff, but not if everyone shuts up and listens for a bit.

[Shining Wrath]

One thing about perception is that usually the entire party is rolling it, and if any of them succeed, they basically all benefit. So unless you're planning to go scout ahead alone, it isn't as important for any individual member to have good Perception.

It's certainly useful, but its not as crucial because you can usually count on the sheer number of D20s being rolled to make it likely that somebody is going to roll well enough.

Unless the DM uses Perception to determine Surprise - those who heard the whoosh of wings were ready for the dive-bombing gargoyles, those that didn't are flat footed for one round.

[JFahy]

Ok that's a cool bit of real world experience that I can't dispute. But were you wearing full plate armour, carrying a shield and did you have a greatsword on your back? Also, was your dexterity score 8 and were you untrained in stealth? :)

Parka and webbing, no, only if a bayonet counts which of course it doesn't, you could make a pretty good case for my Dex being 8, and yes. :smallsmile:



Just to be picky on rules for a second, I think that what your squad-mates did for you was more like an assist action than a group check. They helped you so that you didn't screw up. I'd be totally cool with having the rogue assist the paladin with his stealth roll, but then I'd make him roll it himself. Maybe the paladin could then give the cleric some advice on jumping over the chasm, but what he couldn't do is jump over it for him.

But on the other hand, no I don't really buy the idea of one perceptive character failing to spot something just because he happens to be going around with a blind guy. I mean sure if the bard is singing and the barbarian is raging then it will be harder to hear stuff, but not if everyone shuts up and listens for a bit.

Here's a blind stab at classifying skill tasks - three types.

Type 1: One success overrides any number of failures. A knight rides
over the hill, we make knowledge checks to recognize his heraldry.
If all twelve of us are clueless but you know it's Sir Ambrut, we've
collectively succeeded - and our lack of knowledge didn't make your
recognizing him any more difficult. (You could argue that we might
all start calling out incorrect guesses and throw you off, but that's
a stretch.)

Type 2: One failure overrides any number of successes. Eleven
ninjas and a commoner pulling a wagonload of pipes must cross
a courtyard without waking up the guard. No matter how quiet
the ninjas are, the commoner failing his check is going to wake
up the guard; their awesomeness doesn't make his task any easier.

Type 3: Failures and successes can cancel out. The group is
trying to survive a blizzard (experts can prevent/compensate
for newbies' mistakes), courtiers are trying to work a room
and discover a secret (if I annoy a noble, someone else can
maybe smooth things over, or try to use his agitated state
to get him to say too much)...*

Type 1 makes it tricky to justify group checks. If you don't
use group checks the party's very likely to succeed.

Type 2 makes it tricky to justify group checks. If you don't
use group checks the party's very likely to fail.

Type 3 goes great with group checks. Hurray!


PS: In a lot of ways, I wish we just had group checks instead
of the assist action. The trouble with assist is that it doesn't
consider the two participants' skill levels - I as a science teacher
with a BSc could help a nobel laureate work on loop quantum
gravity. With a group check, I fail every time and success hinges
on the expert's roll, as it should.

The flaw of group checks, of course, is the 'half the group succeeds'
criterion, which means that while you'd love to have one or maybe
three assistants, you absolutely don't want two or four. :smalltongue:



* Try not to fixate on my lousy examples - the point is in some cases
strong characters can carry weaker ones.

[JFahy]

only if a bayonet counts which of course it doesn't

Correction: it does count as a greatsword, because you are a pixie. :smallwink:

[goto124]

No matter how quiet the rogue is, she can't make the paladin stop rattling and banging into stuff.

*searches for relevant OotS comic strip*

[Malifice]

Type 2: One failure overrides any number of successes. Eleven ninjas and a commoner pulling a wagonload of pipes must cross a courtyard without waking up the guard. No matter how quiet the ninjas are, the commoner failing his check is going to wake up the guard; their awesomeness doesn't make his task any easier.

I totally saw this in my mind and laughed.

The Ninjas were not impressed.