DnD: How To Use Checks and Saves to Progress the Story

2022-05-28 11:14:18 By : Ms. Amy Zhang

It's inevitable that some parts of Dungeons & Dragons are tedious. Luckily, using skill checks and saving throws can help with progressing the story.

Many parts of Dungeons & Dragons can take a long time. Parties sometimes travel long distances seeking their next adventure or spend exorbitant amounts of time and gold in towns shopping for magic items and material components for spells. Each of these tasks can be very fun and interesting to play out scene-by-scene. However, some parties may be looking to spend time at the table in adventures rather than the in-between travel, shopping, and other tedious tasks. This is where skill checks and saving throws come in handy.

Skill checks use the randomness of the dice and take characters' abilities into account to determine how choices are played out. These skill checks are the major focus outside of combat for progressing the game. Players use Investigation checks to search a dungeon room for clues or gold and use Perception checks to keep an eye out for enemies while their party members are asleep. These checks, along with saving throws, can also be used to cover large swaths of the game that don't need as much detail.

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The way parties skip over large periods of time is important. Understanding how to do so depends on what the DM or players want to accomplish in a particular area. Some DMs settle on a simple montage for things like travel, giving the players a general sense of the topography and scenery in the area they're traveling. Otherwise, a roll can randomly determine the type of weather, terrain, and events that will take place over a particular day.

How to skip over portions of the story depends on the consequences and rewards in the area or for a certain activity. Perhaps the party is shopping and wants to move along to the next adventure but doesn't want to interact with every shopkeep. If finding the items they need is a difficult task or the consequences for asking the wrong people can be dire, the number and different types of checks must increase so the consequence isn't the result of one bad roll. If not, one Investigation or Persuasion check will suffice.

Another way to take the pressure off a single roll without playing out the scene is to give group skill checks. The result can be based on the average score of the group. This works really well when the whole group is doing the same task. Another way to resolve this situation is to let the players decide what they'd like to do and have each make a check to see how that turns out. Doing this will help give players choice while not diving too deep into the scene and bogging down the story.

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Saving throws can also be great tools for covering large portions of the story. The major difference between skill checks and saving throws is that the players generally ask for skill checks based on their decisions, while outside forces determine when players roll saving throws. When using saving throws for story progression, first determine how players are interacting with the world and how the world would interact with them.

For example, the party may be walking through a Fey-influenced forest. To get through the forest, the party could have one or two players make survival checks, or they could do a group check. However, if the Fey intentionally make it difficult to traverse their forest, the party may need to make Wisdom saving throws to stave off disorienting effects. Using the game mechanics in creative ways like these can keep the story interesting, even when skipping over large portions to get to the heart of the adventure. DMs shouldn't be afraid to shake things up and try out new ideas.

Aaron is a D&D Features Writer for CBR. They have been playing video games since middle school, taking an immediate liking to Assassin's Creed. Since 2020 his new hyper-fixation has been D&D, working up quickly from player to obsessed Dungeon Master. When they're not playing D&D, they're either slinging drinks as a barista or snuggling with their cats and reading one of the ten books they'll never finish.