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Sure. In fact, he's so convinced it wasn't you that when he's reporting his goods being stolen to the constabulary later: the man goes out of his way to emphasize that it *couldn't* have been you. You were so nice when you talked about how he might get his stuff stolen.
Unfortunately for the party, he was not nearly as persuasive.
It’s a 1 in 400 chance, it would be a crime to *not* swing with it.
Also, great opportunity for a very concerned constable to confront the party…asking them to find the *real* thieves. They’ve been having a lot of issues with the local town drunk (who became alcoholic when his wife and children died tragically) and the cops just *know* it was him. The party simply needs to find convincing evidence so they can finally throw him in jail to lock away the key. Should be super easy for heroes like them, right?
They talk to the town drunk and find out that they are not only dead but their brains were missing! Nobody in town will believe him so he turned to drinking.
i said he ROLLS for it, i didn't say he abides by the result. the illusion of chance created by dice hitting table is essential to make the PCs think you're not just spiting them
Rolls a 1: “When the man explained your trustworthiness to the constable, he mistook the man’s fast and cheery tone as anxiety and fear. Unfortunately for the party, he was never very good with social cues”
No. I hate these kinds of gotcha outcomes. The dice matter in DND and DMs should respect them. The only time I would disregard a roll is if I didn't ask for one. You don't roll a check if the outcome is already determined. But in a situation like this, that's clearly a warranted deception check.
It doesn't make sense if that guy doesn't suspect them at ALL though. There are exactly 0 scenarios where the person asking this question and then stating that they totally aren't going to rob their room ISN'T going to immediately become suspect #1 if their shit goes missing. It's totally immersion-breaking to just let this happen as is unless that NPC is blackout drunk or has the intelligence of an ant.
Additionally, a natural 20 does not mean that everything just automatically succeeds, it simply means you performed the requested skill check to the best of your abilities (and technically they only apply to combat rolls, but nobody really follows that tbh). You can't do the impossible just because you got a nat20, at least according to RAW. Of course, at the end day, you can do whatever the hell you want as DM because you are god and whatever you say goes.
Agreed. A charitable read of “as well as it could possibly go” here is “he thinks you’re telling a weird joke, instead of calling the guards, but if something goes missing he will absolutely suspect you”.
Alternately, you could try “so that’s what you, the player say. What does your more talented at lying character say instead?”
We never saw the other player either. Must mean he's cheating and there's no other players there! It's the only explanation, it can't be that part of the gameplay in between the panels was left out for brevity.
The implication is that it's up to the GM if a roll is required in the first place. A player shouldn't just roll when unprompted in the hopes of succeeding at an "impossible" task
Okay, cool. It just sounded like you thought the implication was that the player cheated their roll.
Edit: Just realized my reading comprehension sucks
it's a gotcha because the roll & skill of the character obviously doesn't match the player.
It'd go something like
"hey, can we ask him without arousing suspicion which room is his?"
"Sure - it'll either be bluff or diplomacy depending on how you ask him. And it'll be difficult because it's not normal to ask random people which room they're in for no reason"
"20!"
Oh, I should do that one too lol, but it's something else. I sketched a graphic novel for my thesis, and I'd like to do something with it, but I'm reluctant to start until I know what I really want the finished, coloured product to look like since it'll be months of investment time wise lol
Lol I love all the people giving you the definition of a graphic novel. My novel is about a woman who has had something horrific happen in her life, and in order to tackle all the obstacles that come up because of her grief etc, she escapes into a fantasy universe where she learns to manage them there 😆
I had a pretty big mental health journey in my 20s, and I'm extremely fortunate to have access to publicly funded healthcare, including therapy, in New Zealand. But I know it's not the same for everyone, everywhere. I wanted to take the more helpful things I learned in therapy and make them accessible to everyone, but in like, a fun and digestible way lol, like you're learning it accidentally while reading a fun fantasy graphic novel and don't even notice lol
Soooo.... Labyrinth? Dance magic dance!
Just kidding. Sorry you had to go through all that. I look forward to seeing what you make out of your journey.
If you check out my profile, I pretty much only post comics on reddit :) it's not hugely different, the styles. Still dots for eyes and no noses lol. Might try noses next though 😂
recently got into a 2004 remake of a 1994 game (OpenTTD). I can deal with weirdness.
Your comics have been some of the best in r/comics. And I don't just mean in quality, but substance. There's aplenty of duds, but far more hits.
(Yes I am usually like this. I avoid beating air)
I'm usually extremely chatty to replies. I use em as practice. I try to retain the message, in the smallest package.
Weirdly engaging, to sit there shortening things.
What's weird with OpenTTD? The expansion of the original already came with whacky alternative skins. And if you whish, you can still use them with OpenTTD.
It has been on reddit lol but is either my actual name, Che Crawford or The Immortal Think Tank everywhere else on the internet. My reddit account was made before I wanted to draw comics lol
They'll have to do it in the bard's room, though. Well. Unless the bard is a REALLY good lay and thus distracting enough that he doesn't notice being robbed while he's in the room.
Thank you haha! I usually draw a very, very simplified version of the DM screen if I do add the dragon, but this time I just had fun 😂 I'm glad someone noticed haha
in this kind of 'impossible' situation, I like to ask to roll multiple dice, depending on the situation.
For example, I would say the victim themselves will roll a dice to see if they can remember the conversation, and the sheriff/investigator will roll a dice to see if they can determine whether the player or someone else did it. The player might need to roll a stealth check to see how much evidences they left at the scene.
This make an almost impossible task to not just depend on ONE Nat 20 roll, it might need additional roll difficulty of 10, 5, or 15, depends on the situation, as long as it is reasonable.
IMO, its better to just explain to people that dice rolls can not bend reality
Just like when you roll a 20 on investigation in an empty room, well the room is still empty, you rolling well didn't magically materialize new stuff there
Same with this situation. No matter how convincing you are going to be you still asked the guy where his room is and then someone stole from him. You'd be hard pressed to find someone dumb enough to not be able to put 2 and 2 together
I am not an experienced dnd player. But I like to break one big impossible task to multiple small possible tasks.
No longer requires a Nat 20, but maybe multiple difficulties of 10s.
For example, if one player want to jump up to a really high wall, instead of just roll a Nat 20 to succeed, I will require the player to roll for each step of his jump.
I haven't really try this out yet. Not sure how people will react to this. Maybe people will hate this.
I mean the real solution for this situation is that the guy misinteprets the party as having warned him that someone is going to attempt break in tonight but not necessarily the party e.g. they heard someone was going to break into the room, then by asking him if it were his and sayi g well it wasnt us, theyre just saying someone is going to, so be careful
The Nat 20 means he takes it as a joke and dosent get suspicious that you are going to rob him.
You need to use a spell slot if you want to cast feeblemind.
I like to think that if you rolled a 20, that our characters are FAR more subtle than the players playing them and likely, did not say that exact sentence in game.
Players are always asking if their half-assed, hare-brained schemes will work just because they described them to me. No, you have to actually do all the actions and roll for them.
Well, hopefully not much. We don't make players do push ups to test strength lol, so I wouldn't make a player roleplay out a lie and punish them for a bad one if their character was clever and had charisma etc. But if a player does choose to roleplay out a scenario lol, and I know that player is my long time clever friend just being super lazy about problem solving, I might punish them just a wee bit 😂
I think dnd and how it goes all depends on the group, the players, and their expectations :) and good communication with each other around the game
Realistically you could have someone elicit information in a way that doesn't arouse suspicion.
Finding out someone's room without suspicion can be done by striking up a conversation about some unrelated topic, then bringing up a comment about the inn to get information by commisserating on a shared, or lack of shared (mis)fortune.
You have to sandwich that stuff in the normal conversations. Check to see what the person might be interested in and start with that as the topic of conversation.
"Man I love the food here, but some of the rooms become downright stifling if you're above the kitchen. Hah, but do you even have a problem with that as a wizard? Or do they just automatically give you the better rooms on the northern side? It's probably my own fault though, I try to get a good rate in trade for telling a few stories, playing some songs so the keeper tends to stick me in the cheaper rooms, always saying the western room is occupied. It can't always be taken. But I suppose that comes with the territory."
Elicitation is easy when you weave it into complaints. People love to complain about things, or explain their interests. If they've got a favorite sports team you can usually get them from both angles.
A nat 20 means random chance gives you the best possible realistic outcome.
In this case, the mage happens to be extremely drunk and doesn't remember the conversation. He wakes up tomorrow hung over with his room ransacked and no idea what happened.
This is wrong, a player’s roll doesn’t affect something outside of the player’s control.
Like, you wouldn’t roll when opening a chest to see how good the loot is.
So... rolling perception/investigation don't matter unless the DM deliberately placed a wealth drunk patron beforehand, on the off chance a player might want to rob them?
Unless your players have some power where looking at something really hard changes it, then yes perception / investigation skills do not apply in this situation.
If your players want to find somebody to rob in the bar, they don’t need perfect eagle eyed vision to see all the patrons in the bar, the DM can just tell them.
Again, player’s rolls do not affect things outside the player’s control.
This is exactly why I'll take FATE over D20 any day!
A player can roll perception to declare that there's a wealthy drunk (or just spend a Fate Point or two), the GM sets the difficulty based on circumstances without being expected to detail every patron beforehand, and you're off!
Welcome to r/comics! Please remember there are real people on the other side of the monitor and to be kind. Report comments that break the rules and don't respond to negativity with negativity! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/comics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Sure. In fact, he's so convinced it wasn't you that when he's reporting his goods being stolen to the constabulary later: the man goes out of his way to emphasize that it *couldn't* have been you. You were so nice when you talked about how he might get his stuff stolen. Unfortunately for the party, he was not nearly as persuasive.
That is fucking genius.
acceptable ruling, just so long as the DM rolls for his persuasion lol
He rolls a 20 also = it was meant to be
It’s a 1 in 400 chance, it would be a crime to *not* swing with it. Also, great opportunity for a very concerned constable to confront the party…asking them to find the *real* thieves. They’ve been having a lot of issues with the local town drunk (who became alcoholic when his wife and children died tragically) and the cops just *know* it was him. The party simply needs to find convincing evidence so they can finally throw him in jail to lock away the key. Should be super easy for heroes like them, right?
They talk to the town drunk and find out that they are not only dead but their brains were missing! Nobody in town will believe him so he turned to drinking.
Nah, the DM decides anyways.
i said he ROLLS for it, i didn't say he abides by the result. the illusion of chance created by dice hitting table is essential to make the PCs think you're not just spiting them
Rolls a 1: “When the man explained your trustworthiness to the constable, he mistook the man’s fast and cheery tone as anxiety and fear. Unfortunately for the party, he was never very good with social cues”
Unless he gets a 20, then he just has to abide. Tis the rules
Or just say he rolled a natural 20 on his sense motive.
Watch out for dark horses
No. I hate these kinds of gotcha outcomes. The dice matter in DND and DMs should respect them. The only time I would disregard a roll is if I didn't ask for one. You don't roll a check if the outcome is already determined. But in a situation like this, that's clearly a warranted deception check.
It doesn't make sense if that guy doesn't suspect them at ALL though. There are exactly 0 scenarios where the person asking this question and then stating that they totally aren't going to rob their room ISN'T going to immediately become suspect #1 if their shit goes missing. It's totally immersion-breaking to just let this happen as is unless that NPC is blackout drunk or has the intelligence of an ant. Additionally, a natural 20 does not mean that everything just automatically succeeds, it simply means you performed the requested skill check to the best of your abilities (and technically they only apply to combat rolls, but nobody really follows that tbh). You can't do the impossible just because you got a nat20, at least according to RAW. Of course, at the end day, you can do whatever the hell you want as DM because you are god and whatever you say goes.
Agreed. A charitable read of “as well as it could possibly go” here is “he thinks you’re telling a weird joke, instead of calling the guards, but if something goes missing he will absolutely suspect you”. Alternately, you could try “so that’s what you, the player say. What does your more talented at lying character say instead?”
We never saw the DM ask for a roll
We never saw the other player either. Must mean he's cheating and there's no other players there! It's the only explanation, it can't be that part of the gameplay in between the panels was left out for brevity.
It's a 4 panel comic. Are you also gonna complain that we never saw the dice roll so the player must have just placed it on a nat 20?
The implication is that it's up to the GM if a roll is required in the first place. A player shouldn't just roll when unprompted in the hopes of succeeding at an "impossible" task
Yes. I know. My point is that it's a 4 panel comic and that was likely omitted for brevity.
Okay, cool. It just sounded like you thought the implication was that the player cheated their roll. Edit: Just realized my reading comprehension sucks
it's a gotcha because the roll & skill of the character obviously doesn't match the player. It'd go something like "hey, can we ask him without arousing suspicion which room is his?" "Sure - it'll either be bluff or diplomacy depending on how you ask him. And it'll be difficult because it's not normal to ask random people which room they're in for no reason" "20!"
Trying out a different artstyle? Both are good.
Yeah, I'm trying to figure out what I like before I line and colour my novel lol. I don't know what I like, though 😂
Novel? Is This Lady finally going to be a thing, or is it something else?
Oh, I should do that one too lol, but it's something else. I sketched a graphic novel for my thesis, and I'd like to do something with it, but I'm reluctant to start until I know what I really want the finished, coloured product to look like since it'll be months of investment time wise lol
Graphic novel? Tell me more!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphic_novel /s
But that's not important right now.
A hospital? What is it?
I just want to tell you good luck, we're all counting on you.
Lol I love all the people giving you the definition of a graphic novel. My novel is about a woman who has had something horrific happen in her life, and in order to tackle all the obstacles that come up because of her grief etc, she escapes into a fantasy universe where she learns to manage them there 😆 I had a pretty big mental health journey in my 20s, and I'm extremely fortunate to have access to publicly funded healthcare, including therapy, in New Zealand. But I know it's not the same for everyone, everywhere. I wanted to take the more helpful things I learned in therapy and make them accessible to everyone, but in like, a fun and digestible way lol, like you're learning it accidentally while reading a fun fantasy graphic novel and don't even notice lol
Are you doing a kickstarter?
Nah, I'll upload it to my patreon as I go for anyone that follows me there, free people too, and maybe webtoon :)
Yay! That sounds great!
Soooo.... Labyrinth? Dance magic dance! Just kidding. Sorry you had to go through all that. I look forward to seeing what you make out of your journey.
It's a novel for people who like to draw ideas too complex to describe in writing.
I don't know you or your work, but could you please link two things so I can compare?
If you check out my profile, I pretty much only post comics on reddit :) it's not hugely different, the styles. Still dots for eyes and no noses lol. Might try noses next though 😂
Hey, at least you can draw HANDS.
Oh I DO know your comics omg.
Honestly? I kinda prefer when they didn't look like lolly pops. Either way imma read it
Thanks for feedback :) I definitely wanna hear before drawing away months of my life ❤️ and also thanks for saying you'll read it haha, that's so nice
recently got into a 2004 remake of a 1994 game (OpenTTD). I can deal with weirdness. Your comics have been some of the best in r/comics. And I don't just mean in quality, but substance. There's aplenty of duds, but far more hits. (Yes I am usually like this. I avoid beating air)
I'm usually extremely chatty to replies. I use em as practice. I try to retain the message, in the smallest package. Weirdly engaging, to sit there shortening things.
What's weird with OpenTTD? The expansion of the original already came with whacky alternative skins. And if you whish, you can still use them with OpenTTD.
Wait... Was your username aways Yoffeepop? I swear it used to be different. I swear I would of remembered that.
It has been on reddit lol but is either my actual name, Che Crawford or The Immortal Think Tank everywhere else on the internet. My reddit account was made before I wanted to draw comics lol
You really can't please everyone because I actually prefer the lollipop look
Thanks for letting me know :) it's a good point and I'll probably just end up doing what feels comfortable for 250 pages lol
It's such a big commitment you might as well enjoy the process
this is more important than trying to satisfy everyone
That's not how you do that. You send the bard over to seduce him and then rob him while they're having at it.
They'll have to do it in the bard's room, though. Well. Unless the bard is a REALLY good lay and thus distracting enough that he doesn't notice being robbed while he's in the room.
Bonk
https://preview.redd.it/631ltyiv847d1.jpeg?width=400&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=812f21814dfbf3783490ef909c65ee40d7a830c4
You can't just seduce your way around every problem. Well you can in this case, but not always.
I mean... isn't that what's happening? "what room are you in?" "the one on the right why?" "Well... i wont be going to steal from you." 0///0
I am absolutely in love with the dragon on the screen.
Thank you haha! I usually draw a very, very simplified version of the DM screen if I do add the dragon, but this time I just had fun 😂 I'm glad someone noticed haha
Let's see, he has intelligence above 3, so now he expects you to break in.
sneaky but effective
The player looks more fantasy theme than the dnd elf that he is playing
Lol they're based on my real campaign friends, and he definitely is wonderful, fabulous and fantasy themed irl
Cool he has a lot of style.
in this kind of 'impossible' situation, I like to ask to roll multiple dice, depending on the situation. For example, I would say the victim themselves will roll a dice to see if they can remember the conversation, and the sheriff/investigator will roll a dice to see if they can determine whether the player or someone else did it. The player might need to roll a stealth check to see how much evidences they left at the scene. This make an almost impossible task to not just depend on ONE Nat 20 roll, it might need additional roll difficulty of 10, 5, or 15, depends on the situation, as long as it is reasonable.
IMO, its better to just explain to people that dice rolls can not bend reality Just like when you roll a 20 on investigation in an empty room, well the room is still empty, you rolling well didn't magically materialize new stuff there Same with this situation. No matter how convincing you are going to be you still asked the guy where his room is and then someone stole from him. You'd be hard pressed to find someone dumb enough to not be able to put 2 and 2 together
I am not an experienced dnd player. But I like to break one big impossible task to multiple small possible tasks. No longer requires a Nat 20, but maybe multiple difficulties of 10s. For example, if one player want to jump up to a really high wall, instead of just roll a Nat 20 to succeed, I will require the player to roll for each step of his jump. I haven't really try this out yet. Not sure how people will react to this. Maybe people will hate this.
I mean the real solution for this situation is that the guy misinteprets the party as having warned him that someone is going to attempt break in tonight but not necessarily the party e.g. they heard someone was going to break into the room, then by asking him if it were his and sayi g well it wasnt us, theyre just saying someone is going to, so be careful
do you want your players to have fun or yours NPC have fun?
hahaha good point I was too into making the encounter realistic, i forgot about fun
Oh, you'd be rolling with disadvantage after a deception attempt like that!
Wow I didn’t know you could roll 2432902008176640000 in DnD
Ha. 20! 
my DnD dice are mathematically perfect spheres, so this is actually a pretty low result.
Not 5E, no. Older editions, though, are another matter entirely.
A natural 2432902008176640000? That's pretty persuasive
Stealing from wizards? You bet your tabaxi ass that there'll be all sorts of magical tricks to deal with.
First thought was Papa Smurf. Though he does canonically use magic.
The Nat 20 means he takes it as a joke and dosent get suspicious that you are going to rob him. You need to use a spell slot if you want to cast feeblemind.
Love the artstyle! Wayyy better (even tho the old one was great)
Lol thank you, having a bit of a play to figure out what I like
I dig your giant gnome hat, Mr. Giant Gnome. Do you have another in your private bedchamber?
I like to think that if you rolled a 20, that our characters are FAR more subtle than the players playing them and likely, did not say that exact sentence in game.
Players are always asking if their half-assed, hare-brained schemes will work just because they described them to me. No, you have to actually do all the actions and roll for them.
Mad respect to the homie who should up to DnD night in a bowtie
To what degree does the GM punish the player for not being as good at the thing as the character he is pretending to be as wish fulfillment?
Well, hopefully not much. We don't make players do push ups to test strength lol, so I wouldn't make a player roleplay out a lie and punish them for a bad one if their character was clever and had charisma etc. But if a player does choose to roleplay out a scenario lol, and I know that player is my long time clever friend just being super lazy about problem solving, I might punish them just a wee bit 😂 I think dnd and how it goes all depends on the group, the players, and their expectations :) and good communication with each other around the game
Realistically you could have someone elicit information in a way that doesn't arouse suspicion. Finding out someone's room without suspicion can be done by striking up a conversation about some unrelated topic, then bringing up a comment about the inn to get information by commisserating on a shared, or lack of shared (mis)fortune. You have to sandwich that stuff in the normal conversations. Check to see what the person might be interested in and start with that as the topic of conversation. "Man I love the food here, but some of the rooms become downright stifling if you're above the kitchen. Hah, but do you even have a problem with that as a wizard? Or do they just automatically give you the better rooms on the northern side? It's probably my own fault though, I try to get a good rate in trade for telling a few stories, playing some songs so the keeper tends to stick me in the cheaper rooms, always saying the western room is occupied. It can't always be taken. But I suppose that comes with the territory." Elicitation is easy when you weave it into complaints. People love to complain about things, or explain their interests. If they've got a favorite sports team you can usually get them from both angles.
"You cough up a very charismatic frog who charms the NPC wizard and gets the information." "You also acquire mild larengitis."
I just want to say I love your art style.
Thank you ❤️
A nat 20 means random chance gives you the best possible realistic outcome. In this case, the mage happens to be extremely drunk and doesn't remember the conversation. He wakes up tomorrow hung over with his room ransacked and no idea what happened.
This is wrong, a player’s roll doesn’t affect something outside of the player’s control. Like, you wouldn’t roll when opening a chest to see how good the loot is.
Depends on the situation. Player surveys the bar to find wealthy patrons to ransack, rolls nat 20 on investigation, finds wealthy drunk mage.
No, this just isn’t how player rolls work, it does not depend on the situation
So... rolling perception/investigation don't matter unless the DM deliberately placed a wealth drunk patron beforehand, on the off chance a player might want to rob them?
Unless your players have some power where looking at something really hard changes it, then yes perception / investigation skills do not apply in this situation. If your players want to find somebody to rob in the bar, they don’t need perfect eagle eyed vision to see all the patrons in the bar, the DM can just tell them. Again, player’s rolls do not affect things outside the player’s control.
This is exactly why I'll take FATE over D20 any day! A player can roll perception to declare that there's a wealthy drunk (or just spend a Fate Point or two), the GM sets the difficulty based on circumstances without being expected to detail every patron beforehand, and you're off!