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Bounded accuracy helps prevent impossible tasks

Bounded accuracy is a design philosophy implemented to avoid some perceived problems from earlier editions. The name is a bit unfortunate as 'accuracy' mainly associates it with To Hit and Armor Class bonuses, perhaps bounded bonuses would be a more accurate term when speaking of this design principle in a more general sense.

In combat, bounded accuracy helps prevent one-sided fights with lower CR monsters. Keeping AC and To Hit bonuses bounded means it is not always impossible for low CR monsters to avoid a higher level player's attacks nor is it impossible for the monsters to hit the players in return. This allows for more nuance in combat encounters because DMs can create easy encounters that still have some stakes to soak up resources and low CR monsters can now be used in greater numbers to actually make an encounter more difficult.

Out of combat, bounded accuracy / bonuses is designed to generally keep skill bonuses just bounded enough to allow DMs to create skill DCs that still have a chance of failure for players with a high skill bonus while not making them impossible for players with a lower skill bonus. This avoids players being sidelined and unable to contribute to an encounter because they don't happen to have the right skill proficiencies. The skill bonuses being bounded means the skill DCs can be bounded.

Both of these effects also lead to less pressure on player character to 'keep pace' as they level. For example, players don't have to worry about not being able to hit enemies later on if they don't invest in scaling their To Hit bonuses.

Because these bounds are applied so universally to the entire system, breaking it can have big consequences. Every monster's To Hit bonus is tuned to the bounded player AC. Similarly, the bounds on skill bonuses heavily influence the bounds on skill check DCs. The bounds reduce the numerical distance between being bad or good at something, so in a bounded system an increase by only a small number can greatly increase your odds of succeeding. Breaking these bounds refers to introducing large numbers that the system is not designed around. Breaking a single bound for a single player at your own table might not be a big problem, but publishing content for others to use that breaks a bound means that your content is less compatible with all other content, published and third party.

Bounded accuracy helps prevent impossible tasks

Bounded accuracy is a design philosophy implemented to avoid some perceived problems from earlier editions. The name is a bit unfortunate as 'accuracy' mainly associates it with To Hit and Armor Class bonuses, perhaps bounded bonuses would be a more accurate term when speaking of this design principle in a more general sense.

In combat, bounded accuracy helps prevent one-sided fights with lower CR monsters. Keeping AC and to a lesser degree To Hit bonuses bounded means it is not always impossible for low CR monsters to avoid a higher level player's attacks nor is it impossible for the monsters to hit the players in return. This allows for more nuance in combat encounters because DMs can create easy encounters that still have some stakes to soak up resources and low CR monsters can now be used in greater numbers to actually make an encounter more difficult.

Out of combat, bounded accuracy / bonuses is designed around bounded skill DCs and to a slightly lesser extend skill bonuses. This bounding helps prevent skill checks becoming impossible for players with a lower skill bonus. This avoids players being sidelined and unable to contribute to an encounter because they don't happen to have the right skill proficiencies.

Both of these effects also lead to less pressure on player character to 'keep pace' as they level. For example, players don't have to worry about not being able to hit enemies later on if they don't invest in scaling their To Hit bonuses.

Breaking AC or DC bounds will have the largest consequences. Applying larger than usual numbers to them will start to reintroduce the problems bounded accuracy was designed the avoid, task can start becoming impossible unless to hit/skill bonuses were heavily invested in. It is likely the problem will be even more noticeable when reintroduced like this, because bounded accuracy works best when applied universally. Players do not have many ways to substantially buff their bonuses, there are exceptions like the expertise feature but the point of bounded accuracy is that these high bonuses should not be necessary to play the game and engage with encounters in a meaningful way. Your party should not be required to have a rogue with expertise in survival to even have a chance navigating dangerous areas succesfully.

Like mentioned already, there are features in the game that can be argued break bounded accuracy from the other end by introducing large bonuses. But as long as these large bonuses are not a requirement to meaningfully play the game, they do not reintroduce the main problem bounded accuracy aims to avoid (which again, is impossible tasks). This does not mean high bonuses are necessarily balanced, flooding the game with them will obviously make tasks meaningless and might even encourage breaking bounded accuracy on the other end by increasing ACs and DCs across the board.

Bounded accuracy helps prevent impossible tasks

Bounded accuracy is a design philosophy implemented to avoid some perceived problems from earlier editions. The name is a bit unfortunate as 'accuracy' mainly associates it with To Hit and Armor Class bonuses, perhaps bounded bonuses would be a more accurate term when speaking of this design principle in a more general sense.

In combat, bounded accuracy helps prevent one-sided fights with lower CR monsters. Keeping AC and To Hit bonuses bounded means it is not always impossible for low CR monsters to avoid a higher level player's attacks nor is it impossible for the monsters to hit the players in return. This allows for more nuance in combat encounters because DMs can create easy encounters that still have some stakes to soak up resources and low CR monsters can now be used in greater numbers to actually make an encounter more difficult.

Out of combat, bounded accuracy / bonuses is designed to generally keep skill bonuses just bounded enough to allow DMs to create skill DCs that still have a chance of failure for players with a high skill bonus while not making them impossible for players with a lower skill bonus. This avoids players being sidelined and unable to contribute to an encounter because they don't happen to have the right skill proficiencies. The skill bonuses being bounded means the skill DCs can be bounded.

Both of these effects also lead to less pressure on player character to 'keep pace' as they level. For example, players don't have to worry about not being able to hit enemies later on if they don't invest in scaling their To Hit bonuses.

Because these bounds are applied so universally to the entire system, breaking it can have big consequences. Every monster's To Hit bonus is tuned to the bounded player AC. Similarly, the bounds on skill bonuses heavily influence the bounds on skill check DCs. The bounds reduce the numerical distance between being bad or good at something, so in a bounded system an increase by only a small number can greatly increase your odds of succeeding. Breaking these bounds refers to introducing large numbers that the system is not designed around. Breaking a single bound for a single player at your own table might not be a big problem, but publishing content for others to use that breaks a bound means that your content is less compatible with all other content, published and third party.

Bounded accuracy helps prevent impossible tasks

Bounded accuracy is a design philosophy implemented to avoid some perceived problems from earlier editions. The name is a bit unfortunate as 'accuracy' mainly associates it with To Hit and Armor Class bonuses, perhaps bounded bonuses would be a more accurate term when speaking of this design principle in a more general sense.

In combat, bounded accuracy helps prevent one-sided fights with lower CR monsters. Keeping AC and To Hit bonuses bounded means it is not always impossible for low CR monsters to avoid a higher level player's attacks nor is it impossible for the monsters to hit the players in return. This allows for more nuance in combat encounters because DMs can create easy encounters that still have some stakes to soak up resources and low CR monsters can now be used in greater numbers to actually make an encounter more difficult.

Out of combat, bounded accuracy / bonuses is designed to generally keep skill bonuses just bounded enough to allow DMs to create skill DCs that still have a chance of failure for players with a high skill bonus while not making them impossible for players with a lower skill bonus. This avoids players being sidelined and unable to contribute to an encounter because they don't happen to have the right skill proficiencies. The skill bonuses being bounded means the skill DCs can be bounded.

Both of these effects also lead to less pressure on player character to 'keep pace' as they level. For example, players don't have to worry about not being able to hit enemies later on if they don't invest in scaling their To Hit bonuses.

Because these bounds are applied so universally to the entire system, breaking it can have big consequences. Every monster's To Hit bonus is tuned to the bounded player AC. Similarly, the bounds on skill bonuses heavily influence the bounds on skill check DCs. The bounds reduce the numerical distance between being bad or good at something, so in a bounded system an increase by only a small number can greatly increase your odds of succeeding. Breaking these bounds refers to introducing large numbers that the system is not designed around. Breaking a single bound for a single player at your own table might not be a big problem, but publishing content for others to use that breaks a bound means that your content is less compatible with all other content, published and third party.

Bounded accuracy helps prevent impossible tasks

Bounded accuracy is a design philosophy implemented to avoid some perceived problems from earlier editions. The name is a bit unfortunate as 'accuracy' mainly associates it with To Hit and Armor Class bonuses, perhaps bounded bonuses would be a more accurate term when speaking of this design principle in a more general sense.

In combat, bounded accuracy helps prevent one-sided fights with lower CR monsters. Keeping AC and To Hit bonuses bounded means it is not always impossible for low CR monsters to avoid a higher level player's attacks nor is it impossible for the monsters to hit the players in return. This allows for more nuance in combat encounters because DMs can create easy encounters that still have some stakes to soak up resources and low CR monsters can now be used in greater numbers to actually make an encounter more difficult.

Out of combat, bounded accuracy / bonuses is designed to generally keep skill bonuses just bounded enough to allow DMs to create skill DCs that still have a chance of failure for players with a high skill bonus while not making them impossible for players with a lower skill bonus. This avoids players being sidelined and unable to contribute to an encounter because they don't happen to have the right skill proficiencies. The skill bonuses being bounded means the skill DCs can be bounded.

Both of these effects also lead to less pressure on player character to 'keep pace' as they level. For example, players don't have to worry about not being able to hit enemies later on if they don't invest in scaling their To Hit bonuses.

Because these bounds are applied so universally, breaking it can have big consequences. Every monster's To Hit bonus is tuned to the bounded player AC, severely breaking the AC bounds can thus lead to even high level monsters being unable to hit a player. Similarly, the bounds on skill bonuses heavily influence the bounds on skill check DCs. Published adventures, official and third party, have set their DCs with these bounds in mind. This might not be a problem when only a single player at your table breaks a specific bound, there are ways to circumvent AC after all and you are generally not proficient in every single skill. But it's ill advised to break the bounds when publishing content for others to use, as it will be less compatible with other content.

Bounded accuracy helps prevent impossible tasks

Bounded accuracy is a design philosophy implemented to avoid some perceived problems from earlier editions. The name is a bit unfortunate as 'accuracy' mainly associates it with To Hit and Armor Class bonuses, perhaps bounded bonuses would be a more accurate term when speaking of this design principle in a more general sense.

In combat, bounded accuracy helps prevent one-sided fights with lower CR monsters. Keeping AC and To Hit bonuses bounded means it is not always impossible for low CR monsters to avoid a higher level player's attacks nor is it impossible for the monsters to hit the players in return. This allows for more nuance in combat encounters because DMs can create easy encounters that still have some stakes to soak up resources and low CR monsters can now be used in greater numbers to actually make an encounter more difficult.

Out of combat, bounded accuracy / bonuses is designed to generally keep skill bonuses just bounded enough to allow DMs to create skill DCs that still have a chance of failure for players with a high skill bonus while not making them impossible for players with a lower skill bonus. This avoids players being sidelined and unable to contribute to an encounter because they don't happen to have the right skill proficiencies. The skill bonuses being bounded means the skill DCs can be bounded.

Both of these effects also lead to less pressure on player character to 'keep pace' as they level. For example, players don't have to worry about not being able to hit enemies later on if they don't invest in scaling their To Hit bonuses.

Because these bounds are applied so universally to the entire system, breaking it can have big consequences. Every monster's To Hit bonus is tuned to the bounded player AC. Similarly, the bounds on skill bonuses heavily influence the bounds on skill check DCs. The bounds reduce the numerical distance between being bad or good at something, so in a bounded system an increase by only a small number can greatly increase your odds of succeeding. Breaking these bounds refers to introducing large numbers that the system is not designed around. Breaking a single bound for a single player at your own table might not be a big problem, but publishing content for others to use that breaks a bound means that your content is less compatible with all other content, published and third party.