My main problem comes from people with charisma: 8 on their sheet trying to "just talk it out" and succeeding on the strength of their real life personality. I know you're personable in real life Alex but you dumped charisma now sit down and let someone else have a go.

When playing a face I usually sound like "I flash my most disarming smile and, fully sincerely, tell him if he surrenders no harm will come to him." Third person narration. I don't usually want to go line by line.

Totally depends on the vibe. In my group, acting out persuasion or deception checks is most common, but sometimes someone can't think of exactly what to say and so just outlines the gist in a detached way - e.g. "I go on about how the safety of the city is top priority, allow us access so we can continue our search for the fugitive". Not specific, but general. Either works, and the general form is bare minimum IMO.

Players Decide, PCs act.

You tell me what your PC wants to achieve and how. I set the DC to check how well they perform at that attempt (or declare "no roll needed", because it's trivial / impossible).

You want to persuade an NPC? Tell me the gist of your argument and I'll consider how receptive your target is and set a DC for checking how well your PC can present said argument.

(In some cases like "I want to hit them real good with my sword" or "I want to climb up that wall", no detailed description is necessary, we both know what you mean.)

The barbarian isn't going to just say "I roll athletics" without explaining what they are trying to achieve. Same for persuasion. "I try to convince the mayor we are experienced enough adventurers to assist" is enough to let the GM know what the intention is and give context for the NPC's possible reponse.

I struggle with this, I make a minor effort but what am I meant to do when my high Cha, high Diplomacy character is more charismatic and diplomatic than me? :( I either skimp on the RP or do some very unrealistic RP as my awful unconvincing wording magically convinces the NPC anyway.

If Brayden says his character tries to lift a heavy rock and he proceeds to deadlift 150kg to demonstrate, heck, I'll give him inspiration.

A character performing a persuasion check should attempt to describe and act out their persuasion.

Once complete, the GM should evaluate the description, and use that as a modifier to the persuasion roll.

A character that says "ummm, IDK, I guess I just try to influence them using my high charisma" should get no modifiers to the roll. A character who tries but entirely flubs the conversation should get a -1 (when appropriate), a great performance with an entertaining flourish to the description should get at least a couple ++ to the roll.

In my games the DM calls for a check. The player describes their intentions and then the DM calls for a check when appropriate. So if someone gives really good reasoning for an NPC to act a certain way, there might not be a persuasion roll, if the character says something dumb then the roll DC might increase. The point is, no one is allowed to say “i roll persuasion to get them to do X”

Sentences like "Can I roll for persuasion?" or worse "I perception the room" are one of my biggest pet peeves coming from players. Tell me what you want to accomplish, I will tell you whether and what you need to roll. I've mostly managed to train that behavior out of my players, thankfully. As a newbie DM I used to use die rolls as a crutch -- "this is a dice rolling game, so the more dice we roll the more fun we're having, right?" I thought. I also hated saying no to my players, so stupidly high DCs were a way to shift the blame onto the dice for my players' failures. As I've gained experience, I run a much less dice-heavy game. I very often just let my PCs succeed with no roll required.

The one case where I don't mind the players asking to roll is when they ask to "INSIGHT CHECK" à la critical role; it's always fun to see the players so passionately engaging with NPCs.

I had a game in Middle School that involved describing how I was supposed to arrange a ladder to climb up the side of a wall. We went back and forth for over an hour, because my DM kept insisting I couldn't turn the ladder sideways.

Now, if my players want to deliver a particularly clever bit of prose or describe a novel engineering technique, I just give them a +2 on the roll and that's that.

I dunno, i appreciate being able to gloss over certain mundane actions with the shared understandings of common actions. Shopping, for instance, takes loads more time when everyone's in storyteller mode, and you never really know how many more sessions you've got before a scheduling error comes up. Best to keep the routine parts brief.

Schmoozing a merchant for a better deal is best handled with a persuasion check, assuming getting a good deal isnt an important part of the campaign.

Basic descriptions aren't necessary but helping in a lot of cases. And in some it's completely the same ("I want to roll an insight check" vs. "Do I believe his story?" - there's simply no describeable process making a difference).

Also players are different... I won't punish a guy playing a high int, high charisma character for not coming up with a logical or persuasive argument (and again "I want to talk to him to change his mind" vs. "I want to roll for persuasion" is all the same here), just as I don't punish a nerd playing a barbarian for not actually being able to lift a person one-armed.

But then I know my players and assume new additions are acting in good faith to their best ability and not just roll-playing because they want to have more time to focus on Candy Crush.

In my opinion if the player doesn't tell me their Intent, what they are trying to achieve, how can I assess difficulty? Assess danger? Imagine consequences? I also want the tools for the task they set themselves upon. For the barbarian weapons used, positioning etc. For the talker their arguments. Acting out is not necessary.

Or just use an apocalyptic principle: "to do it, do it". If the character doesn't do anything that triggers a move no move is triggered.

Now I want to play a one shot of extreme DND where every skill check has a real life equivalent. Making a DC 25 knowledge check? The answer is in one of these books, you have 15 seconds to look through them.