Emulating Character Knowledge in D&D: Abstraction Versus Interaction

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Sometimes the players have a sense of how to do things their characters can do, so for example, a player may have ridden a horse, played cards, shot a bow, etc. However, sometimes a player will have NO IDEA WHATSOEVER how to do something their character can do. 

In a case like this you can either use an existing mechanic if it applies, assign odds that the action will be successful and roll if there is no existing mechanic, or you can walk through the situation with prompts. I do the latter. Today we had an encounter just like that. The party decided they wanted to buy a ship, but they were just short on gold. So The party thief asked if he could do some pick pocketing to cover the difference. I said, “sure”, and he said he wanted to roll for it. 

I said, “wait a second, what are you doing”?

He said, “I’ll go to the market and pickpocket someone”. I said, “OK, you are in the market, there are hundreds of people around you, moving, buying things, talking, city guards are walking around, who are you going to pickpocket?” 

PLAYER: “I don’t know”. 

So there we were. The PLAYER has no idea how to pick a pocket, what to do, what to plan, it’s entirely foreign to him. The CHARACTER however would no doubt be very familiar with what you have to do to set up a successful pickpocket. In a situation like this I ask leading questions to emulate their skill without reducing it all to a boring, single roll. 

Me: “Let’s talk this through, you are a thief, you have broken into places and you have pickpocketed before. So you would think about a few things: who to target, avoiding detection, and what to do if it goes wrong.” So how do you want to handle those?”

There was some conversation. PLAYER:”Should I stay in one place or move around?” Me:”If you stay in one place people will pass by you, so your location matters, and you can tailor your location to what you think will be the most helpful. if you move around, location isn’t fixed but you will see more potential targets and you won’t draw as much attention as you aren’t staying in one spot”.

Rather than tell them what to do, or give them an arbitrary suggestion, I detail what I think a thief would think about in this situation, and outline pluses and minuses. Players often say things like, “My thief character would know the best place to stand” and stuff like that, instead of just answering them with a “OK, you know that the best place to stand is X”, I say, “standing here is good for this but bad for that, standing there is good for one thing but bad for another”

In short, don’t tell them “THE ANSWER”, tell them some possibilities and let them weigh them out, this allows the player to have agency but somewhat emulates the idea that the character would know what they are doing.  

So he decided to stay in one place. REF: “Where do you want to set up”. We call up the map, he picks a part of the market where the tents border on a section of buildings with narrow alleyways between them. REF: “Anywhere in particular?”. 

He responds, “I should stay near a tent that sells expensive stuff, so that wealthy people will come there.” Now he’s getting into it. “OK, here are some of the tents in the area, tack and harness, knives and swords, religious symbols, rugs, custom armor and weapons, exotic mounts and animals …” 

PLAYER: “Stop”

REF: “Yes?”

PLAYER: “Isn’t fighting a big deal here, and Lords of the Houses wear custom armor and stuff?” 

REF: “Yes”. 

PLAYER: “And what sort of mounts?” 

This is a tropical setting, in a marshland, giant lizards are common mounts, horses are only found in the city with its even streets, and are prized for their speed and the status they show as they are expensive. 

REF:”Horses and jaguars” 

PLAYER: “I set up out about 5 tents away from the armor and mounts tents, near the edge where the crowd passes by. I’ll look for wealthy patrons going to either one of these tents.”

Some leading questions have got him thinking about the anatomy of the job. Now he asked one of the other players (the party assassin in this case) to walk around the area where he was standing and keep watch for the ward patrols. If one showed up, he would whistle a signal. Then they started to discuss what happens if he failed to pickpocket and was discovered. The party illusionist agreed to stand nearby in the crowd towards the buildings that bordered the market. If the pickpocket attempt went sour then the thief was to bolt in his direction. When he passed the illusionist would cast change self on the thief, and he could slip into the crowd and escape. 

IMC I have spell research rules, and this was a 2nd level version of the spell change self that the illusionist can cast on others (the 1st lv version cannot do this)

So now it was just a matter of time. The thief set up and waited. 

REF: “So who do you target?” The player thinks for a time and says, “Someone who looks wealthy”. 

REF:”What do you mean, ‘looks wealthy’”

PLAYER: “Wearing nice jewelry and clothing, large money purse, walks like they own the place, that sort of thing.”

So I assume that about one person per turn will be “wealthy looking” enough to merit attention, and I describe the first person to qualify, “Tall saturnine lizard man with a large red ruby ring, an elaborate surcoat and shiny leather boots, you can just see his money purse on his belt under his left arm. He is well built, muscular, carries a dagger.” 

In the city, open carry with anything other than a dagger or staff will get the city watch on your tail or get you challenged by a Lord of one of the Houses. 

PLAYER: “He only has one ring, how big is the money purse?”  

REF: “There is a med sized belt pouch with the tell tale jangle of coins on the inside, it looks to hold about 50 coins and is maybe half full.” 

Here I'm giving the PC information that I figure a thief would know, they would be able to guess at the amount of coins a pouch could hold based on a look and how much they were holding based on sound.

PLAYER: “Not interested” 

REF: “OK, another turn goes by and you see a woman with an elaborate gold trimmed and embossed and engraved steel breastplate with the symbol of an orange flower on a field of green. She wears a sword openly, a cloak, several rings, and as she walks you see a large money bag on her hip that seems full of coin as well, this one perhaps 100 coins. She has two armored men following behind her that have a similar crest, they are dressed in chainmail and carry heavy maces.” 

PLAYER:”She carries the sword openly?”

REF: “Yes”. 

PLAYER: “She must be a Lord or maybe the city watch, hard pass.” 

The player was tapping into his knowledge of the setting, weapons restrictions, martial practices, the encounter was drawing out this knowledge to manage the situation. This is so much more fun than, “I pick someone rich looking roll my pick pockets percentage.” 

So another turn passes. I roll and an actual ward patrol comes by.

REF:” A group of soldiers come towards your spot, it is a ward patrol, 5 guards in Lorica Hamata with broadsword and axe, 3 crossbowmen, 3 soldiers on giant frogs with short swords and javelins, a sergeant with trident and crossbow and a white robed druid, his left arm wrapped in thorny vines, and his gorilla mask hiding his face. All guards wear the crest of House Ain, a red tent with a red sword suspended above, on a field of black. They ride towards your position. Are you going to do anything?” 

This was just me keeping him on his toes. They weren’t after him, but he wouldn’t know that. He didn’t take the bait though. 

PLAYER: “I do nothing.” 

REF:”They pass by, and in another turn and you spot a potential target, this one is an old rakasta, a bit less physically intimidating, he appears out of shape and languid. He is dressed in fine silks of dark orange with a wide brimmed yellow hat crested with green and gold feathers. He rides a giant lizard on a large leather saddle. Walking in front of him are two burly lizard men, wearing only kilts, each of which has no apparent weapons. They are clearing the crowd ahead of the man and his giant lizard. You notice that the man has a large money bag slung across his chest that bulges with coins, and he carries an ornate jeweled silver dagger on his belt. His fingers have several large rings, he has a jeweled bracer on one arm, and his saddle is embossed with brass trim.”

I find that the more information I give, the more they ask for.

PLAYER: “I look at his mount, are there any bags on the saddle or elsewhere within easy reach?” 

REF: “On the back of the saddle there is a metal cylinder of some kind that looks out of place and added on, other than that there is an obvious waterskin on the left back of the saddle and a bag hanging off the right side.”

The player fixated on the metal cylinder. Smart lad. I decided that this was a wealthy merchant, the lizard men were his guards, and he carried gems on his person (he was there to pick up mounts) and the cylinder kept them safe.

So the player decided that this was his mark. He moved in and made a close pass walking behind them, he checked out the cylinder and asked if it looked like it could be pried off. At this point I suggested a find traps roll to see if he could tell if it could be removed.

He made that roll, so I told him that the cylinder itself was likely made of iron, but it was held on to a regular saddle with two iron staples, and the thief had a short crowbar he carried with him as part of his thieves tools. He could slip it between the saddle and the cylinder, give it a good wrench, and it should come off. He said he wanted to try. I told him that it would require two rolls, first, a remove traps roll to wrench it off, and a pick pockets roll to do so without being noticed. 

However, I told him that if he just walked over and tried to pry it off it would definitely alert the rider. He needed to do something to distract him to get the chance to even try to remove it without being noticed. There was some conversation, and he decided to follow the man for a time until something came up to distract him and his guards.

I told him that there was a 1 in 6 chance of a distraction significant enough to keep their attention for every turn they were in the market, and I would roll to see how many turns they were there. 

I rolled 4 turns. Then I rolled every turn, a 2, a 4 then a 1 on turn 3. So I described it this way:

“You see a giant boar with a druid mounted on top, surrounded by baskets of mistletoe in a ring around him. The boar is heading in the same direction as the lizard.” 

PLAYER: “I get closer”

REF: “The boar is just slightly ahead of the giant lizard and neither the lizard men guards nor your target seems to notice”. 

PLAYER: “I get right up beside the rear of the lizard, near the cylinder.” 

REF: “The giant boar crosses in front of the giant lizard, and it has to stop suddenly, with your target pulling on the reins.” 

PLAYER: “I make a move for the cylinder with my crowbar”

REF: “OK, first make a remove traps roll to slip in the crowbar and pry it off, then make a pick pockets roll to see if you did this in a way that wasn’t noticed because the giant lizard was lurching back and the rider and guards were distracted.” 

I could have just given it to him because of the situation, but I figured there is an art to doing this in such a way as it harmonizes with the movement of the giant lizard and doesn’t stand out. So he rolled to pry off the cylinder (the remove traps roll), and was successful. 

REF: “You slide the crowbar between the cylinder and the saddle and pry it, with a single firm wrench the cylinder comes free into your hand. Now let’s see if anyone noticed, roll your Pick Pockets attempt.” He rolled, he failed, and failed by enough that he was noticed. 

REF:”One of the lizard men turns and sees you stuffing the cylinder under your arm. He shouts at you”. 

PLAYER: “I bolt towards the illusionist”. 

Now, I had them roll initiative, the thief rolled a 2, the lizard man that noticed him rolled a 4. So the thief got 2 segments of movement. He’s a rakasta, so his movement rate is 15”, so he covers 30’, now the lizard man and his fellow guard start running, they have a movement rate of 12”. So in segment 3 the thief ran 15’ putting him at 45’ away from the lizard, the lizard men ran 12’ from the front of the giant lizard, so they are now approximately 45’ away from the thief. The next segment the thief runs 15’, they run 12’, so they are now 48’ away from him, and next round they will be 51’ away as he is faster. He reaches the illusionist and he casts change self on the thief, making him look like a farmer.

The last roll I have to make is to see if the guards noticed the illusionist doing the whamma jamma casting the spell, 1 in 6 chance of that, they fail, the thief is now in the clear, looking like someone else. He waits until the lizard men and the target on the giant lizard pass, then he slips off through the crowd to rendezvous with the illusionist and assassin later. 

Success!

I know refs that would take a player in this situation and just say, “OK, you go to the market, roll your PP percentage to see if you grab some cash from someone”, and only if they failed and were detected would anything come of it. I’m fine with that, and it can work well enough, but I find this method to be FAR more interesting and far more challenging to the player. 

What is interesting here is that the player had to do a lot of groundwork before making his rolls, and to get that groundwork done I had to ask a lot of leading questions. This is the imperfect solution to the fact that the player doesn’t know what the character knows, but the character is supposed to be skilled. To mimic that without just making a single resolution roll, I ask the leading questions, presenting multiple options to the players rather than just saying, “your PLAYER would know that”. This gives the player input, and makes it a tense, uncertain situation.

But it also mimics how the CHARACTER would be knowledgeable about doing this sort of thing, even if the player is not. This balance point, between metagaming and just fully abstracting an action with a dice roll, is the goal for me when adjudicating this sort of thing. 

The haul? 5 gems, a scroll and a potion. It should be enough when added to their funds to get them their merchant galley, it will be interesting if the thief remembers to give the guild a cut, and if he doesn’t, I will have to roll to see if they find out about the job… 

Urban adventures are where it is at.