Complex Skill Checks

Complex Skill Checks
With most skill checks, a single die roll immediately determines whether or not a character succeeds. If a character wants to jump across a chasm or recall a specific piece of information, his success or failure is apparent after a single check.

For complicated and time-consuming tasks (such as disabling a very complex trap or researching an obscure bit of knowledge), or at times when the GM wants to build tension and suspense, the complex skill check variant described here might be called for. In such a case, a specific number of successful skill checks must be achieved to complete the task. The complexity of the task is reflected in both the DC of the required check, the number of successful rolls required to complete the task, and the maximum number of failed rolls that can occur before the attempt fails.

In most cases, one or two failed rolls does not mean that a complex skill check has failed, but if three failed rolls occur before the character makes the required number of successful rolls, the attempt fails. Although three failures is a common baseline, GMs are encouraged to change the number if the situation warrants it.

The GM can also apply a penalty to future rolls in the complex check if the character rolls one or more failures. For instance, an intricate trade negotiation requiring a complex Diplomacy check might assess the character a -1 or -2 penalty on her checks for each failed check made as part of the complex check (representing the tide of the negotiation turning against her).

Each die roll is one portion of a complex skill check, and each die roll in the attempt represents at least 1 round of effort (it might represent more time, depending on the skill or task in question).

Like skill checks, ability checks can also be complex.

Complex skill checks are rarely used in situations that call for opposed checks.

Successes Needed
During play, the GM will encounter additional situations in which complex skill checks may be appropriate. Two questions then arise: How high should the DC be, and how many successes should the task require? The answers to both of those questions depend on how great a chance of success the GM wants the players to have.

Although making these determinations might seem daunting, the system for complex skill checks actually provides the GM a great deal of flexibility. Under the standard rules, GMs have only one tool to represent increasingly difficult tasks: increasing the DC. With complex checks, the GM can also use the number of successful attempts required to achieve overall success to control a skill check’s difficulty.

Trying Again
Complex skill checks can usually be retried, however this depends on the consequences and if the GM allows it. However, like normal skill checks, some complex skill checks have consequences, and those consequences must be taken into account (for example, a trap that requires a complex tool skill check to disarm is triggered if the attempt fails).

Some skills are virtually useless for a particular task once an attempt to accomplish that task has failed, and this includes complex checks as well as regular skill checks. The Complex Skill Use section, below, describes which skills can be used in complex skill checks and which allow retries after failed attempts.

Interrupting a Complex Skill Check
Most complex skill checks can be interrupted without adversely affecting the result of the check. However, the GM is free to rule that interrupting a specific check affects the result, especially if there is a time limitation.

At the GM’s discretion, an interruption can count as one failed roll in the check’s progression or can mean that the complex check fails.

The Help Action
You can use the Help action normally with complex skill checks. Characters helping another character must take their Help action prior to the other PCs roll, and must be able to help in some meaningful way. The GM has the final say on whether or not a character can assist with the Help action.

Group Checks
Sometimes the entire group is performing an action at once. In these scenarios, consider using less skill checks, but make them group checks (the majority of the group must succeed in order to gain a success).

Why Complex Checks?
Complex skill checks allow the GM to build suspense in critical situations, add tension to multiple-round tasks during combat, enhance special adventurespecific tasks, and resolve complex activities more quickly.

To build suspense with complex skill checks, the GM can simply substitute a complex skill check for a normal skill check during a critical task. In most such situations, using a complex check lessens the likelihood that one failed roll will cause the party a significant setback.

Complex skill checks provide a more balanced way of creating combat-affecting situations that depend on skill checks. For example, a complex Investigation check made to find the weak spot in a narrow stone bridge might allow the characters to collapse the bridge more easily and elude a group of powerful pursuers.

Complex skill checks can also enhance adventurespecific or location-specific tasks such as disabling a particularly complex trap, appraising an extremely rare work of art, and so on.

Complex skill checks let players resolve complicated situations with fewer die rolls. This is especially true of complex social interactions requiring multiple Bluff, Intimidate, or Persuasion checks.

In most situations when the GM feels a complex skill check is warranted, it’s appropriate for the DC of a complex skill check to match the DC of a simple check involving the same activity. This decreases the character’s chance of achieving overall success, but because complex skill checks are used to best effect in tense situations and climactic encounters, increasing the difficulty adds spice to the scenario.

Increasing the number of successes required always increases the difficulty of the task, but the degree of increase depends greatly on how likely the character attempting the check is to get a success each time he rolls the die.

Complex Skill Use
The following section provides general guidelines for using the complex skill check variant with each skill in 5th edition.

Arcana
A complex Arcana check could represent extended research for spells or magic item formulas. To attempt a complex Arcana check, a character must have access to a library that the game master decides is sufficient for the task. The game master is also free to rule that several successful rolls in a complex Arcana check exhaust a particular library or tome’s resources and lead the character to another work or library. In this way, a complex check can become an adventure in itself as the character searches out rare or lost volumes of information.

Acrobatics and Athletics
Acrobatics and Athletics are generally a poor choice for extended checks since these skill checks are designed for short movement and a single skill check.

A few specific environmental situations might call for a complex Acrobatics check. The most obvious of these and by far the most common is a long, extremely narrow passage that is only wide enough to let a character wiggle through. In this case, each successful roll made in the complex check represents navigating a portion of the passage, and a failed complex check means the character is stuck somewhere within the passage.

Extended checks could be used for extreme feats of coordination or endurance, like Olympic gymnastics or long-distance running or physical games and competitive matches.

Animal Handling
Complex skill checks work well with the extended training times that some uses of the Animal Handling skill requires. When an animal is trained for a general purpose such as combat riding or hunting, it requires several weeks of work and one simple Animal Handling check under the normal rules. With the complex skill checks variant, this use of the skill always involves a complex skill check, with each die roll representing one week of training time. Rolling three failed results during the complex check means that the entire attempt fails and that training must begin again. A character performing a lengthy demonstration of difficult or trick riding, or competing in a race, might have to make a complex Animal Handling check to pull off the entire show or finish the race; one roll per round is probably appropriate.

Deception
Almost all uses of the Deception skill require only a single roll to indicate whether or not you successfully fool an individual or a small group. However, in certain complicated social situations, a GM might want to speed the game along by requiring one complex Deception check rather than many simple checks.

For example, one of the characters wants to spend several days in a noble’s court trying to convince the people there that he and his adventuring companions are more capable than they really are. Rather than roleplay the many individual interactions, the GM decides to simulate this activity with a complex Deception check. Because the nobles have heard little of the group’s exploits, the GM sets the DC at 25 and requires that the player achieve five successful rolls before rolling three failures. Although this is a good simulation of the character interacting with a series of minor NPCs over several days, the GM still decides that interactions with a few individuals (the duke, his chancellor, and one renowned knight in the duke’s service) are too important to incorporate into the complex check, and decides that the player should roleplay short encounters with each of the three and make separate, simple Deception checks for each of them.

History
An extended History check should be treated like an extended Arcana check when researching long lost information, or putting together clues.

Insight
Although typical use of the Insight skill does not allow retries or lend itself to complex skill checks, a game master might choose to simulate an unusually complicated series of social encounters in a deceitfilled environment with a complex skill check like those described under the Deception and Persuasion descriptions.

Intimidation
Although typical use of the intimidate skill does not allow retries or lend itself to complex skill checks, a game master might choose to simulate an unusually complicated series of social encounters with one complex skill check in the same way that Deception and Persuasion can be used in such situations.

Investigation
The Investigation skill seldom lends itself to complex skill checks. In rare cases, the game master might rule that a relic from a lost civilization or an extremely powerful magic item might require a complex skill check to appraise properly. In these cases, the DC and number of successes required should be determined by the game master specifically for the item in question.

At the game master’s discretion, certain very wellhidden items might require a complex Investigation check to find. Usually this activity represents several individual Investigation attempts made in sequence and is typically better handled by treating each separate attempt as a normal Search check.

Alternatively, if an item has a common value that is accepted in most of the campaign world but a drastically different value in one small portion of the setting, it might require one simple check to appraise the item’s common value and a second, complex check (usually at a higher DC) to assess the item’s worth in the specific area.

When using Investigation to gather information, the skill allows characters to get a general impression of major news items in a city or to find the answer to a specific question or information about a specific rumor. As long as the character has only a few questions or rumors to follow up on, a simple skill check should be used. In situations where the characters have half a dozen or more leads and questions to follow, the game master might want to use one complex skill check to resolve the informationgathering attempts. In this case, the number of successes required equals the number of questions or leads pursued, and the game master determines the number of failures that ruin the complex check.

In a complex Gather information check, each die roll represents 2 hours spent pursuing each individual question or lead.

Complicated books, convoluted essays, or coded documents might require a complex Investigation check. When a character attempts to decipher an extremely long document, the GM can require one complex skill check rather than a simple skill check for each page. The DCs for complex checks follow the same guidelines that normal Investigation checks follow (DC 20 for simple messages, DC 25 for standard texts, and DC 30 or higher for intricate, exotic, or very old writing). Succeeding on the complex check requires that the character achieve one successful attempt for every ten pages of the manuscript before failing the check three times.

Medicine
While most uses of the Medicine skill are defined as simple checks, game masters are free to require complex skill checks to treat particularly virulent strains of a disease or especially effective mixes of certain poisons. Research or especially complex medical procedures could easily be extended skill checks.

Nature
Generally, Nature checks are single use skill checks, however, there are some great complex skill check uses as well. When using Nature to navigate the wilderness to a desired location or even to follow tracks across a desert, for instance.

Perception
Since one Perception check represents one attempt to notice something, using the skill does not usually lend itself to complex skill checks. A GM could request an extended Perception check for guard duty to stay aware.

Performance
At the game master’s discretion, a few rare and powerful magic instruments might require a complex Perform check to activate. Writing exceptional music, speeches or other artistic measures might also require extended skill checks.

Persuasion
Although typical use of the Persuasion skill does not allow retries or lend itself to complex skill checks, a GM might choose to simulate an unusually long diplomatic session or interactions with multiple small groups for an extended period of time with one complex Persuasion check.

For example, a character wants to convince a large and fractious group of merchants to suspend travel through a dangerous area for a short amount of time so that he and his companions can adventure in the area and confront the monsters there without exposing innocent travelers to danger. Instead of rolling thirty or more Persuasion checks and roleplaying the reaction of each merchant in the group, the GM uses one complex skill check with a DC of 25 (representing the extreme difficulty of getting all the quarrelsome merchants to agree) that requires five successes before rolling three failures. The GM also might rule that because the tide of opinion can turn against the character very quickly in this case, each failed roil applies a cumulative 2 penalty to further rolls in the complex skill check.

Religion
Religion is generally a single skill use skill. Religious research, a spirit quest or a philosophical debate could all be uses for a complex skill check.

Sleight of Hand
Normal use of the Sleight of Hand skill does not lend itself to complex skill checks. A character performing a lengthy demonstration of legerdemain (such as a magic show relying on Sleight of Hand) might have to make a complex Sleight of Hand check to pull off the entire show, one roll per 15 minutes is probably appropriate.

Survival
The game master might rule that a complex Survival check allows long-term survival in one type of climate or terrain, raising the required number of successes for extreme environments such as arctic regions or deserts.

Stealth
Normal use of the Stealth skill does not lend itself to complex skill checks. In certain unusual situations, a game master might use a complex skill check to simulate navigating an intricate environment such as an urban area while remaining unnoticed (this might mean blending in rather than remaining entirely out of sight in particularly crowded areas). For example, if a character wants to move from one place to another within a large city without being seen by members of the city watch, the game master might use a complex skill check to simulate the character’s progress without having to determine the location of every guard or roleplaying each encounter.

Disabling a Trap
Nearly any trap can be made to require a complex Sleight of Hand check rather than a simple one. If the trap requires a large number of successes (six or more) or if the attempt is ruined by less than three failures, adjust the challenge rating of the trap up by 1 or 2 to reflect the greater difficulty of disarming the trap.

A trap that requires a complex skill check may have a higher cost and challenge rating than a trap of the same sort that only requires a simple check; see Table: Complex Disable Device Checks. See the standard rules for trap costs.

Opening a Lock
Although normal locks require only one Dexterity check, the game master is free to include locks or a series of locks that requires a complex check to open. (He can also rule that each casting of a knock spell counts as six successes toward opening a complex lock.) Particulars for complex locks are given in Table: Complex Opening Locks Checks.

Mixing Complex Skill Checks
GMs may design complex skill checks that require more than one type of skill or can be achieved by use of more than one skill, even with different DCs.

Example: Researching location of an Artifact
The thirteen scrolls of Inu-Herit are rumored to contain the largest collection of necromancy rituals known to man, and the reader will gain the knowledge of immortality (or lichdom!).

Requirement: 10 successes before 5 failures. At least 2 successes must be achieved in Arcana, History and Investigation each.

Arcana: DC 25, to hunt down rumors of the scrolls and their powers.

History: DC 25, to research the ancient Khemetian culture and history, including the secretive cult of Inu- Herit.

Investigation: DC 20, to piece together all the clues unearthed from all the investigation work.

Better Training
You may train a new skill proficiency, tool proficiency or weapon proficiency or language during downtime.

This requires the expenditure of 250 gp, and requires a number of 8 hour days training equal to 250 divided by your Intelligence modifier.