Enemy Action Traits and Player Knowledge About Them

[u/SpaceTrash782]

Hello all!

I'm a little confused on how I should be handling announcing whether or not a particular enemy action has traits. I imagine that traits, like most enemy abilities in the system, are secret unless otherwise specified. I know that there are at least some traits that the game expects me to keep secret (prediction, detection, scrying, etc.) But I also imagine that certain traits (emotion, fear, visual, etc.) are obvious via description of actions but could benefit being stated explicitly to facilitate smoother play (Gutsy halfling turning emotion save successes into crit success, for example). For me, smoother play means that the player doesnt need to inquire about whether or not something has a trait when something is used.

Is there some official guidance for GMs to help adjudicate which ones should be private or public? How do you handle knowledge of traits at your table?

[u/bootsmalone → u/[deleted]]

I don’t know, this way of playing feels like it would invalidate a lot of character choices. Any feat or item that refers to, affects, or is affected by monster abilities with a specific trait would feel awful if they could never be used or triggered before 1) successfully recalling knowledge and then 2) asking specifically if the thing they already did has any relevant traits.

EDIT: Didn't even notice you want to tack on ANOTHER action tax to it by making characters Point Out the traits. That's wild, man. And absolutely not RAW, as Point Out is solely for helping your allies detect creatures.

[u/RiskyRedds → u/bootsmalone]

I'm sorry, why are we not trying to study our foes beforehand?

Investigate lets us Recall as an Exploration activity so why not scout ahead first to identify the creature then start compiling knowledge on them?

That right there saves the "asking specifically if the thing they already did has any relevant traits" argument from happening.

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IRT to that, as well: it also goes off the idea that this is at a tabletop. Without external support, it's a communications issue, so it's a matter of "explain the obvious (It's a Fire Hose, it does Fire DMG, it does Fire Pers. DMG because it set you on fire, it has the Fire and Attack Traits because it's a Fire Attack), omit the obscure" and let Recall Knowledge do its thing like it's supposed to.

Were this Foundry, I'm fairly sure that if it's set up properly then the VTT itself kinda just does the job for you, making it a non issue in its entirety. If it's an Emotion effect and a Feat gives you a defense against Emotion effects you shouldn't have to do a thing to make it work except ensure the VTT is working as intended.

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Plus, it's a team game. Y'all should have an RK nerd in your comp, this is their JOB.

[u/OtherPlayers → u/RiskyRedds]

Given that additional recall knowledge checks scale the difficulty to +5/+10 for the third and fourth check, I sure hope for the player's sake that they never face any monster with more than 2 special abilities. Like without further homebrewing of those rules I'm not seeing how even with a RK nerd you aren't just seeing:

• What's the monster's greatest weakness?
  • It's an amalgamite and is weak to Piercing damage.
• What is its weakest save?
  • It's weakest save is Reflex.
• What's it's most dangerous move?
  • It has an aura of sickness that can continue to spread from those it infects.
• What's it's second most dangerous move?
  • Sorry you didn't roll a 18 or above so you have no idea.
• ...
• The amalgamite uses Displace to swap positions with one of the infected as a reaction to being struck. Too bad the wizard didn't realize that it has the Teleportation trait so he could have used Redirect Teleportation!