RPG Pet Peeve When Players Meta Skill Checks & Abilities
Red Dice Diaries does a video series called RPG Bugbears and I love that series. Those videos have been inspiration for a lot of videos I have done and now I am going to give my "Bug Bears" on my blog. I run a lot of games and one thing that comes up often is players not explaining what they are doing but they ask if they can make a (insert skill) check. I then ask them how are they using that skill. What are they hoping to figure out. The other thing they may do is request to use a certain ability that they know they have a higher score in because they don't want to be forced to use the lesser score.
You may be asking why would that bother you Juce? I think it bothers me because they are not thinking like their character. They are thinking by the numbers on a piece of paper. This may be a shock to some out there that know me but I do want my players to play in character. Yes I am ok with players optimizing their character and running whatever they want. When that guy is made though I want them to do things that they would normally do. Players shouldn't just play as though this is a game that they have to beat. This is a role-playing game and yes it should also have some tactics as well.
When players ask me that I always ask them to describe what they are trying to do and I will tell them when to roll a skill check. Sometimes I may not have them make a roll for it and will give them the information. Do players ask to do this because they want to just roll some dice? Would love to hear your thoughts on this topic.
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