Tracking without the Feat

[dergon darkhelm]

Just being pragmatic is all.

I've posted 'til I'm blue in fingertips looking for scouts.

But I place no fault on the DMs that do log in to run a session who expedite play with some creative skill checks or subtle maaipulation of the D&D rules. ....That is what DMs are well within their appropriate roles to push story lines both in PnP and here in ALFA. Ayergo's style is great. SO is the style of a DM who wants to see a chapter of this story arc go forward today perhaps even when one player is missing.

Would I like it to be different and have 4 PCs playing the House Invinicble scout service or a couple Helmite "deep cover" rogues that honed their skills infiltrating a Cyricist sect and now are expert duneon sappers? Of course I would. But I don't....and the game goes on.

[mr duncan]

But I place no fault on the DMs that do log in to run a session who expedite play with some creative skill checks or subtle maaipulation of the D&D rules.

This is exactly why skill based PCs are feeling left out. This also isnt DMing but instead it is writing a movie or play where the end will be the same no matter what the PCs have or do.

You dont have any scouts because you dont have an actual demand. If you dont get a scout then your DM will let you clerics make some dice rolls you arent allowed to make? What if they let you make these checks but then you fail them all? Should they still let you succeed? Pick a lock you cant? All of those things? All of them in the same story?

The only valuable PCs left are the ones that have skills the DMs wont let you cheat your way past. Fighting and the healing that results from fighting are the only skills that cant/wont be faked. We would think it pretty cheap and cheesy if a DM healed up the party after battles in place of a cleric, a DM that killed your monsters for you for "The sake of the story" would be laughed at... but somehow its cool for them to let you ignore skill checks because your crew has nothing but fighters and clerics?

There is no "Advancing the story" excuse. The story is happening no matter what, the girl you were trying to save from the gnolls geting /eaten/ if you dont have a tracker to follow the gnolls trail after dark, that is story too. The story hasnt failed because you have to go home and tell her village that the gnolls got away with her. Thats only your PC failing.

We can always fall back on "The DM is always right" and say sure let anyone track without the tracking feat, but then we could break any rule with this reasoning and we wouldnt need any forums to argue rules or set standards. We do those things, so clearly there is a line. I think giving everyone the tracking feat whenever they need it is crossing that line


J

[Rotku]

You've got very firm ideas of how things should be run there, Mr D. Ever thought of taking up the DM Wand? Then you can prove that your bite is just as big as your bark. I'll tell you, skill based PCs rule when there are DMs around.

Anyway, I'm going to lock this thread as well. I'm not sure where it is going, but I get the strong feeling that it is drifting the same way as the other thread - complaining how hard life is for non-Fighter/Cleric PCs. kiyoti has pointed out what the SRD said (maybe not the best forum to use, but it'll work) and others have added their bit in. If anyone strongly feels that this should be unlocked again, I will do so, but I do feel people are repeating the same complaint over and over and over and over and over and over and over again.