5e addresses this by assigning much more responsibility to the DM. According to the rules as written, the DM should only call for a skill check when there's _possibility_ and _consequences_ for success/failure.

On top of that, the way they rebalanced skill checks and AC ("bounded accuracy") makes the game feel a lot better. This [1] is a fantastic article specifically addressing those changes, if you're interested.

1: http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Understanding_Bounded_Accuracy_...