What is a "quality check"?

Question

In the Appendix A of Ghosts of Saltmarsh, there is a section about Magical Storms on page 205, relating to each of the different schools of magic. The one about divination magic says:

When divination magic seeps into a storm, howling winds and residual whispers temporarily scramble the knowledge of a ship's crew; for 1d3 days, the ship's crew suffers disadvantage on all quality checks.

What is a "quality check"? Is this a mistake? I assume it means ability check, but maybe it refers to something from a previous edition of D&D (I know that the adventures were from previous editions, so maybe these rules were lifted from previous editions too?). Has there been errata released about this?

Answer 1

Quality is a measure of the skill, experience, morale, and health of a ship's crew

This mechanic for a ship's crew was first developed in the Unearthed Arcana 'Of Ships and the Sea' and then released officially in Ghosts of Saltmarsh.

You can find all of the relevant information in Appendix A in the section titled 'Officers and Crew' (p. 196.).

In summary, a crew's 'quality score' can be positive or negative and varies over time as good (strong positive leadership) or bad (causualties and poor health) things happen in your adventure. Shore leave is one reliable way to improve a crew's quality score.

If a crew's quality score dips below a certain point then there is a risk of mutiny. In order to see if mutiny actually occurs the captain must make a 'quality check' (a charisma roll modified by the crew's current quality score) once per day.

The divination magic infused storm imposes disadvantage on this roll for 1d3 days. Any ill effects are avoided if the crew's quality score is currently high enough that they aren't actually having to make mutiny checks at all.