this post was submitted on 10 Feb 2024
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I really don't like how 5e made all social skills charisma based, too. Like you're always simultaneously good at persuasion, intimidation, and deception. It feels to me like most of the time one of those should be your go to strategy, not pick whatever is best for the moment and you're good at all of them.
That's what proficiency and expertise is for. Higher charisma makes a character more naturally adept at those skills, but limited to no more than +5 unless you specialize in one of them. A +5 is nice, but when you start running into higher DC checks, like 15-20, a +5 isn't super reliable.
I still think it's too generalized, but I get your thought process. A giant muscley barbarian should be good at intimidation, as should a spooky necromantic wizard, but it's not designed to make that easy to do. 3.5 did a better job at skills I think.
You can always just ask the dm. Intimidate via strength for the barbarian isn't all that uncommon
I am the dm, but yeah I get your point. There's always ways to homebrew things.
As a DM, the rules-as-written are more a suggestion than rules. As long as you're consistent with applying your modified rules, give that Barb an Intimidation bonus based on STR or whatever you like. I have a pretty decent sized list of rules I treat differently than RAW, because some spells and abilities are never used - why cast anything else when you have access to Fireball?