In this discussion about knock, I'm curiuos what people believe a L2 Wizard spell should do regarding the opening of locks.
Should it auto-open locks, or just help the target to open a lock? How many locks should it open or help open, and with what duration?
20 foot radius aura, all locks within are unlocked, lasts 10 minutes a level. Given that NI locks are defeated for 60 gold, a 2nd level spell had better be better than that. Especially since the Open Lock skill is entirely worthless.
Knock should give 5+CL competence bonus to recipient on all open lock checks for 10 min/level. Cast it on the rogue and step back, because wizards should never be the one opening locks in the party. It also allows the recipient to use the Open Lock skill as a swift action.
Seems in line with Bull's STR as a buff.
Very clever. Unfortunately the others probably don't realize you just called it completely useless.
linklord, I would have to refute your second point: part of the rogue's schtick is picking locks as per the designer's original intent. At least, that's what the PHB would leave you to believe. I would say that, if a rogue has Open Lock ranks, a DM would be a bastard not to let him have a the spotlight for that decision at least occasionally!
Now if only the Open Lock skill were actually worth anything and picking locks were a big deal!
I'm trying to be open minded here, but.. dear god everything you say in this post is what's wrong with the game.
And what would that be, that you not only can bypass simple locked doors in non expected ways but that you should?
And what if you need the lock later? What if you're trying to get in and out in stealth, without being discovered, with no trace someone was in the room to begin with, or in another situation where breaking it (which is an option, but not always a desirable one) isn't a good idea? Ooh, whoops, standard action Knock, never mind. That's less time than it even takes the Rogue, and that's IF he's rolling a nat-20. There's no DC limitation there, either, so when the rogue, who puts ranks in Open Lock to solve this kind of problem, expending his limited character-building resources to be able to solve it, the caster has 4th or 5th level spells and can blow a 2nd level spell without much thought.
If you need the lock later too bad, unless you slice the hinges instead. If you want to be quiet you use Silence. Whatever the case you don't bother with the Open Lock skill as even a natural 20 will fail to open the lock, and you don't use the Knock spell to do what a cheap item and a Standard action will do.
(And don't say anything about Open Lock being a poor choice for a high-op character. It's only a poor choice because the Knock spell exists. Locks and such are why the rogue is supposed to have these kinds of skills, part of their very reason for being.)
Even if the Knock spell did not exist, the Open Lock skill would still be entirely incapable of opening level appropriate locks, and there would still be other and better ways of dealing with that.
If your character's entire reason for being is skills, your character is worthless, especially when they can't even do that much right, which is the case here.Entirely unobtainable? I just checked my DMG, I'm not seeing an unobtainable number. A second or third level rogue taking 20 can pick even the hardest typical locked door (a 28, by my book). Special locks (from the Open Lock skill description in the PHB) have no 'level-appropriate' guideline, but look to be within the capabilities of a rogue at some point, and intentionally given in order to scale. (Unless the DM is intentionally throwing a tougher lock, which could happen, but that's on the DM, not the open lock system.)
A 28? What DMG are you reading? Level appropriate locks at 3 are DC 40. Of course he doesn't have a chance in hell of touching that until level 10, which is why you'll solve the problem in other ways.
You know this because the DC 40 lock is a mere 150 gold, thus the enemy can easily afford it for the important things. Even the much cheaper DC 30 is still entirely untouchable though, and that can go on all the semi important things.
Keep in mind using Open Lock normally is a full-round action, meaning it's only taking the character a total of 6 seconds to pick. That's supposed to be for 'easy' locks for your level, not the ones that are supposed to challenge you. Those require either a lucky roll in the middle of an encounter (perhaps after a few retries), or after the combat is mopped up, the resident rogue setting up for two minutes and getting it done on a take-20.
All the more reason not to bother, as not only will he not get the door open he is giving enemies two full minutes of buff time. Congrats on getting the party swept Mr. Rogue. And he's playing with a lock in mid combat? Wow, what a useless character.
...ehh, NO! Dear gods, is that what you think the game should always be? I weep for your players.
Tactical considerations are always a factor yes. Further, getting swept because you didn't take your meta into account among other things means that you cannot roleplay if you are dead. You will misconstrue this, but yes absolutely.
I hope you realize that if we change the base assumptions of the game (IE, SoD/S/Ls), the rest of the system moves to accomodate? 'Standard meta practices'? Why should that be required? I realize I'm arguing this point on effectively a highly-CharOp community, but c'mon! All this kind of thinking does is force an aggressive arms race between DM and players. I've played that game, I don't like repeating it. I'd rather see those kinds of situations neutralized, so a wider array of options are available, rather than forcing everything.
What it does is create a fast paced tactics game, something that is mentally engaging. We've seen what happens when you remove the speed from the game. Most people went back to 3.5. Standard meta practices are required because otherwise you have an incoherent game. If you take this as player vs DM then you're going about it wrong.
Did you ever stop to consider than perhaps it's because those other options are so much stronger, that's why Open Lock is useless? If you altered those other methods, Open Lock wouldn't be useless.
No, it's because you waste two minutes playing with a lock and still do not open the lock.
