Athletics or Acrobatics - Dungeon Master Tools

Acrobatics or Athletics... never mind, just RUN!

For Fifth Edition Dungeons and Dragons characters have a variety of skills they can excel in. Some of these get boosts based on race, class, and experience. One of the trickier determination players and DMs run into during the course of the game is determining if a physical action requires an Athletics skill roll or an Acrobatics skill roll.

What I have seen happen is that the player wants to roll the skill they have the higher score in (naturally) and may push back on the DM when the call for the other.

For example, the Rogue is attempting to climb up a castle wall. Like most Rogues, her Dexterity score is high and she gets a bonus to Acrobatics skill roll. She asks to use her Acrobatics skill to see if she succeeds in climbing the wall. But the DM asks for the strength based Athletics skill instead, determining that it takes physical strength to climb the castle wall. The Rogue scoffs. Her Strength ability score is low and she has no proficiency in her Athletics skill. Her attempt at being the cool infiltrator is neutralized.

Was the DM correct?

On page 175 of Players Guide you see an explanation of the Strength ability score. It describes it as the measure of... "bodily power, athletic training and the event to which you can exert raw physical force." Page 176 describes Dexterity as the measure of "agility, reflexes and balance." So the skills related to those abilities would correspond.

Specifically, the Athletics skill which is related to the Strength ability "covers difficult situations you encounter while climbing, jumping or swimming. The Acrobatics skill which is related to the Dexterity ability "covers your attempt to stay on your feet in a tricky situation, such as when you're trying to run across a sheet of ice, balance on a tightrope or stay upright on a rocking ship's deck".

Having the right gear at the right time is always good.

I would say that the DM in my example made the right call. Climbing a castle wall would require an athletics skill roll. This doesn't mean the Rogue is neutralized. If she has climbing gear in her equipment pack, she can use that to reduce the difficulty class (DC) of the climb check. Or maybe she has rope and grappling hook prepared. Because she has a high dexterity, she would probably get a nice bonus to throwing the grappling hook (the DM could treat that as a missile weapon attack, something that a high Dexterity score would improve). Once the rope is secured, her climbing DC will either drop or vanish completely (depending on the DM).

Let's try a different example. A Paladin and Rogue are on top of a tower watching a battle between dragons. It is all fun and exciting until the brass dragon hurls the blue dragon directly into the tower they are on. The violent shock causes both characters to loose their footing and start to fall off the tower. The Paladin wants to roll Athletics counting on his high Strength ability to keep his solid stance. The Rogue thinks an Acrobatics roll is needed instead, her high Dexterity would surely come into play in this situation. The DM decides that it will be an Acrobatics check. Sure enough the Rogue keeps her footing, but the Paladin loses his. Crying out in alarm, the Paladin falls over and the weight of his armor and momentum from the tremor sends him hurtling toward the edge!

At this point the Paladin can attempt to grab hold of a piece of masonry to stop from tumbling over the side. As a DM I would ask for a Strength saving throw and if he fails that, maybe let the Rogue roll a Dexterity saving throw to see if she gets her rope out to the Paladin in time for him to grab at it.

"How dare you sir. I would never smash into a tower!"

There are other instances that may be a bit grey, where it seems like either check may apply. In that case, if the players can provide convincing reasoning why they would use one skill check instead of the other, go ahead and let them roll it. Remember that the idea is to create a fun exciting story around these characters. You don't want to stop them from being the cool heroes. As a DM you want them to succeed, but not with out peril.

With new players it is important to remind them that they can use anything in the environment on their person in unique ways. Before they make that check, ask them to look through their gear, review their spell list or give them a hint from the environment description. New players may be more used to video games, where that kind of thinking isn't as frequent.

Hopefully this helps guide you on how to adjudicate which of these two skill rolls to ask for and when. They are ones I see most often confused and argued, but have you seen ones that come up more frequently?

The Dragon of Icespire Peak Campaign Diary - Episode 16 - Botched Bountyhunters

The prep...

"How tough can a rogue traveling with a druid
and a unicorn really be?"

I wanted the players to start the session with a bit of combat. Things have been simmering between them and Haylia's hired toughs for a while now, and I figured it was time for the two groups to face off. I decided that the Halfling spy was tired of being humiliated and he convinced the other three toughs that they could capture the Rogue and get the bounty on her head for themselves. So they set up an ambush for the characters as they were leaving Gnomengarde. Unfortunately for the goons, the group decided to spend the night with the gnomes, so any advantage they would have attacking at sundown would be lost. Still, these guys are stupid, so I figured they would try it in the morning anyway.

I also prepped for the Highharvest Festival that I had been hinting at over the course of the game. I had found some ideas for fun festival activities. I also decided that Lillian would be selling silvered weapons at a discounted rate (one of the upcoming adventures contains creatures that can only be hit by silvered or magical weapons).

Unfortunately we had a real late start this session and we didn't get much past the goon attack. The group spent some time in Phandalin afterward doing some minor things, but we decided to end the session before the festival started (little did I know this Festival was turning into a major part of the game).

The story...

Gnomish goodbye?

We jumped backward in time a little bit, as I had the characters settle in the bunkhouse for the evening in Gnomengarde. I asked them about watches and the decided to take them. During the Druid's watch, she heard a strange noise from outside. She did some investigating (making some great stealth rolls) and could just make out a figure moving away from Gnomengarde toward the narrow pass leading into the area. She returned to the bunkhouse and told her companions about the figure the next morning.

The party said their goodbyes to the gnomes and then headed out. But they were being super careful, rolling for perception checks and survival checks to find footprints. They rolled very well and noticed sets of fresh footprints in the area. They saw the spot where the gorge narrowed, and realized it would be a great place for an ambush. So they were ready when that ambush occurred.

I was using the standard Bandit stat blocks from the Monster Manual for these guys. I tweaked some of the weapons a bit by adding a short bow here and a hand axe there. It didn't impact the damage output too much. All it really did was alter the flavor of the encounter. I had two of the thugs attack from range and under partial cover. The other two would get in close with clubs and try to knock out the Rogue. Well the party rolled really well for initiative, and got some of the first shots off. The bandits rolled poorly and missed just about everything at range. The Druid unleashed her Moonbeam spell again and pretty much torched the two thugs with clubs. The WORST SPY EVER was knocked out by a Sleep spell from Donnabella and the last one surrendered when he failed a morale check.

Sleeping halfling dreaming of a gooseberry pie
as big as a mountain!

I do like rolling morale checks for enemies. I essentially have them make a Wisdom Saving throw against a DC I decide. If the battle is going poorly the DC is higher. The last thug, a dwarf, rolled pretty badly and surrendered. The group questioned him and he said that the WORST SPY EVER came up with the idea to ambush them and convinced them all to do it for the coin. He also told them a little more about the bounty hunter that was after them. He said she was known as The Huntress, and that she was very famous for always taking her bounty. But that she thought of the whole thing as a game. The group let him live and he ran off toward the sea. But the group took the sleeping halfling spy and tied him to the collapsing pool and dragged him back to town.

What followed was them dragging the poor guy along with them as they visited each and every place in town as a public display of not messing with them. They visited the general goods store, and experimented with the Treasure Barrel. They purchased the petrified mouse, and then tried to send the construct fish back through the barrel. It didn't work, but I kept rolling a 1D4 to see if it anything would happen. Then they went to the inn and had a drink. I had Quinn Hightopple run in and punch the tied up spy in the crotch, much to the delight of the players. Then they went to the Shrine of Luck, and finally visited Harbin.

Every adventuring party needs a pole.

They gave Harbin the Hat of Wizardry for 50 gold. But he wasn't interested in the other items. He asked them to stay for the festival (he is thinking it would be good to have them around for extra security). I told them about the events at the festival, so they would have an idea. Harbin also reminded them about the other two missions. One is an escort mission to the Gold Toe Mine and the other is to check on a Logger's Camp. The characters had seen the dragon flying around near the forest, so they weren't too excited about going there. But they also didn't fancy an escort mission. They talked it over for a little but in the end decided to figure it out after the Festival. They are also intrigued about the lighthouse and the source of power within it.

Finally they paid Donnabella for her time, and she said she would be happy to travel with them again. Then they dragged the Spy back to Haylia. She was very very upset after the party told her what happened. She assured them that she had nothing to do with the ambush and that the spy would be punished and that they wouldn't have to worry about seeing him... ever again. It was rather ominous. She also mentioned that she was more annoyed at the loss of money from the whole thing and that working for her was lucrative and the option was still open for the Rogue.

The group headed back to the inn, and we ended the session there.

The post...

Everyone loves gourds, right?

This session felt a little flat to me. I think it was because we got started late. But also because the players decided to drag the spy around with them through the whole town as a kind of punishment. This added extra town material to the session that I wasn't planning on. I had assumed we would jump right to festival day.

The players had fun, but I felt like I was spinning my wheels. I just need to get over that kind of thing as a DM. If the players want to drag the annoying halfling prisoner all over town, let them do it. I admit there were some funny moments and comments from the locals that came of it. But I was itching to get to the festival events. I'm going to want to prep some handouts for the next session so they have things to reference about the festival. All this material is home-brew, and I see how much the group enjoys handouts and other physical props.

Up Next...

Session 17: The Night Before the Festival

5 Things I Learned Being a Dungeon Master for Fifth Edition Dungeons and Dragons

I always roll behind the screen!

Since getting back into playing Dungeons and Dragons a few years ago, I have had the pleasure of running games of various sizes. My first couple games in Fifth edition were on the short side, lasting a couple sessions of about four hours a piece. I've run a couple one shots last about four hours, and of course I'm running my Dragon of Icespire Peak campaign.

It's been an interesting experience running those three types of games. I've learned quite a bit from the experience. So in no particular order, here are some of my observations and lessons I picked up from running these games.

1. You are the only one who knows that the players missed that really cool room/treasure/encounter.
• The first adventure I ran was a dungeon crawl that lasted two, four hour sessions. I worked on it for a good couple weeks coming up with traps, cool encounters, interesting non-player characters and a fun boss battle. When we finished the first session it became obvious that I crated too much material. I was actually annoyed that they were going to have to miss some of the fun things I thought up if we were going to end the game the next session. For a while I was disappointed by the experience. But when I talked to the players, they really enjoyed it. I was the only one who felt that it wasn't as good as it could have been, because I was the only one who knew about the stuff they missed. 
2. Nothing is wasted, it just goes into the next adventure.
• That is when I picked up the cool NPCs and plunked them down into the next short session I ran about six months later. I took one of the traps they avoided, and tweaked it for the new setting and used it. Again I made a bit too much material for this second game so some of that stuff got shifted to the one shots I ran almost two years later. Just make sure you keep your notes, because you never know when it will be useful.
3. You control the pace.
• Yeah, learned this the hard way. The second game I ran I set up like an old school

  

  THAC0? We don't need no stinkin' THAC0!

  Mission: Impossible adventure. It was all about setting up the mission and executing. I tried to create tension, but instead I created long periods of waiting around. It got tedious and boring. The thing is, I didn't have to be. The DM controls the timing, and it is fine to just jump ahead to the good parts. There are ways to build tension in Dungeons and Dragons, but they tend to work better in the immediate situations. I've gotten a lot better at pacing since then, but yeah, that was a rough game.
4. Prep for the next session only.
• World building is a blast, and coming up with all these great schemes and villain plans is a lot of fun. But there are so many times that you never get to those moments, or when you do it is six sessions later and so much has changed that your original plan doesn't even work. Even running a published adventure like Dragon of Icespire Peak doesn't guarantee that you will follow the written path. The players will do their own thing, come up with innovative solutions, and take the story in unusual directions. So the best thing to do is to have a very lose outline of your overarching plan. But really focus on prepping for that next session. Don't get lost in the joys of world building when you never get a chance to get out of the village.
5. Handouts



Oh you think you know it all? Well, you haven't even
begun to learn. (insert evil chuckle)

• Players like to have things they can reference, review and dig into. This can be a simple menu for the tavern, or a letter from an enemy or a treasure map. Playing at the virtual table, it can be a bit tricky, but possible to come up with all kinds of written material for the players to interact with. Remember rule 4 and don't spend an outrageous amount of time of these, but do spend some time. When you are playing at the physical table, having physical spell scrolls to hand out, actual inspiration tokens to manipulate and even magic item cards can add to the game. It is one of things I think The Essentials Kit did so well with their box. I love the two sided map and having those cards for the sidekicks has been a lot of fun (since I ended up using about half of them to people Phandalin). 

So there you go, a few things I've picked up, and I'm still learning and picking up new techniques for being a better Dungeon Master.

Do you have any tips you want to share?

What's in a name? - Name List - Dungeonmaster Tools

When you absolutely must roll a 100...

Dungeons and Dragons can involve a lot of improvisation. You can plan out your adventures, roll up your stats for monsters, and attempt to anticipate your player's every move or reaction. But in the end, the players will do what they please. You may prep for the dungeon delve beneath the mountain, and your characters decide to seek out the floating castle they heard about six sessions ago. You've got nothing prepped for the floating castle, and now your players are obsessed with finding it. Quick thinking is needed.

This kind of thing happens all the time, but you can have some tools ready to make the minor challenges roll a bit smother (yes, a dice pun in a Dungeons and Dragons blog, big shock). One issue that I've run into many times is the characters deciding to talk to a random non-player character (NPC) they pick out of a crowd. All you said was, "you are on a crowded street" and suddenly our players are questioning a washer woman about the dragon they saw flying around the town. Sure you have to improvise her reaction, but the worst part is when they ask you her name.

Here's a tip: you can't name every random NPC "Bob", it is going to break immersion.

Instead you should always have a list of NPC names handy. At the very least have 10 male and 10 female. If you want to go crazy you can narrow it down by race too. So you can have 10 male dwarf names and 10 female dwarf names, and elf names, and halfling names, and dragonborn names and... well you get the idea. However you decide to do it, this little tool will save you a bunch of time head scratching and endless NPCs named "Bob".

It has just a lot of stuff, if not "everything".

One of my favorite supplemental books for 5th Edition Dungeons and Dragons is Xanathar's Guide to Everything. It is packed with great stuff for players and dungeonmasters alike. Well worth picking up after you have the core rulebooks. In its Appendix B at the end of the book it contains 17 pages of names that you roll up using a D100. It gives you fantasy names as well as historical names. Plenty of names to pick from when building adventures, characters or just to have handy for those random NPC moments.

There are also plenty of online tools for name generation out there. And these can be very handy to create your lists ahead of time.

When you do assign a name to the random NPC make sure you make some note somewhere with a brief description of the NPC, what name you gave him or her and what they told the party. This is necessary because for some reason your players are going to latch onto that one random NPC instead of the ones you spent hours creating, and they will proceed to bring them when you least expect it. So make sure you have these notes handy so when they ask to speak to Rezena the Dragonborn clerk in the tiny fishing village from session 2, and you are now in session 40 and you just happened to be passing that fishing village and they want to pop in and say "hi" you have an idea of who they are talking about.

So there you go, one of the most valuable DM tools and one that you won't regret having around, even if you are running a published adventure.