One of the "limiting" factors of skill challenges (SC) as described in the books is that they "assume" that the players will do X to achieve Y. One of the greatest things about roleplaying is that it is not normally limiting in this fashion. After all, there is a live DM that can actually make value judgements based on experience and the situation, rather than a CPU simply going off its programmed routine.
This makes sense. As I said, the forced narrative structure might be his problem with skill challenges. I'm not sure yet.
As such, SCs need to feel as organic as if they were part of the naturally occurring action rather than a side trek mini-game. I personally do not like to call attention to the metagame that is occurring behind the scenes during a SC. The same way that I don't like calling attention to the metagame that is occurring during a combat. Instead of saying how many hit points a creature has I describe the action as the characters, not the players, would experience it. The bloodied condition (a metagame trigger) is great for knowing when the descriptions should change during a combat (he's heavily out of breath and clearly fatigued, bleeding from a multitude of cuts, etc.) I like the descriptions from the players to be vivid, the more vivid the better. I try to do the same, and I like reacting to them (their descriptions) organically rather than everything being a measured predetermined response. Every success in a SC should trigger a description that moves the action forward and therefore shows progress. Every fail in a SC should introduce a complication and be described as such, but the action keeps moving forward.
My preferences for handling combat and skill challenges don't entirely line up with yours. I announce the bloodied condition very explicitly, but I also describe what their enemies look like along the way (the closer they are to 0, the more beat up they look). And, every success or failure in the skill challenge pushes the action forward, so no problems on my end here. I've been running skill challenges in my own RPG (X successes before 3 failures), albeit with different rules, though I'm used to utilizing the basic structure already.
IMO, there are usually things that will "win" specific "sections" of a skill challenge. They are the "success" conditions that might not even require a roll. The same way that there are situations where some things should create automatic "fail" situations. It has a lot to do with the context of the particular challenge. But it has a lot riding on the presentation, which should always be from the POV of the characters not the players.
Right; I basically say that certain skills may not be available right now, based on context. So far, my players are very good about doing this themselves, though. If they don't feel like Endurance has a place, they won't try to shoehorn it in, even if they have a big bonus (like the dwarven Fighter does).
Also, if their character doesn't need to roll to succeed, then that's not really a challenge in the skill challenge, and thus won't contribute to the outcome either way. That doesn't mean that they can't still use the skill, mind you; the skill is considered a success (though not counted for the skill challenge), and it changes the context of what's going on accordingly. It just means that it doesn't take up their turn, and they still need to make a contribution, as normal.
Well there are some broken glass panes on the ceiling of this greenhouse, which under most circumstances immediately gets players attempting Athletics and Acrobatics to get to the top and fix this glass. What if a character simply asks the NPC if she has a ladder?
If there is a ladder (and there likely is if they're asking, because I'm nice like that in 4e, what with my "yes, and" and stuff going on), I give them +2 for having a good idea, and make them roll (ladders can fall). That seems simple enough to me.
Nobody ever asks, which shows why the framework for SCs is so clunky.
I don't think my players would skip asking. Also, I don't think asking is a problem for skill challenges. At least, not in my experience.
The first problem with skill challenges is that they tend to immediately be approached from the metagame of "I only have X skill(s)".
My players do tend to look over their good skill first, but this makes sense to me. In real life, people tend to attempt what they're good at first. However, they don't stop there. I've had multiple players roll Perception untrained, for example, because they're keeping an eye out for something specific (that might also set them up on their next roll, or help another player). If "I only have X, so that's all I'll ever consider" is a problem for many groups, it seems like my main group and my new 4e groups have both side-stepped this particular issue.
If a character asked for a ladder I'd give him an auto-success for this part because it fits. Under the base framework he might get a ladder, or not, depending on the DM. He'd still have to make Athletics checks, which is counterproductive to making the challenge feel organic.
Only if the check was only purely to climb up. In my skill challenge, it'd likely be "you climbed up, and now you can roll your Athletics to help rebuild stuff" or something. Or, "you found a ladder, and can climb up. Now what?" Depending on the answer, I'll make them roll something. I'm not going to give an auto success away for finding a ladder, but I'll still reward it.
Personally, I can't see how your method is any more or less organic than mine. Both reward obtaining the ladder, and both rely on what's actually happening in the fiction, and both follow a set narrative structure (X successes before 3 failures). You choose to end yours a little earlier or a little easier (auto success), but I don't get how that makes it any more organic. Perhaps I'm missing something, though, and my player feels like you do. Can you explain why you feel your method is more organic than how I'd handle it (+2 bonus, "you can climb, but what do you do now?", etc.)?
It is similar to having someone make a perception check if they ask to look inside a drawer. Why? They asked the obvious question then give them the success. Try to always frame skill challenges from the perspective of the characters and don't get hung up on the "skill" part of the name. I've started to call these Encounter Challenges (EC) rather than SCs, because of how I want to perceive them and present them.
I'm not running a skill challenge so that I can bypass the forced narrative structure of the skill challenge; as far as I'm concerned, that defeats the purpose. If looking in the drawer helps them, then it helps them within the fiction. However, I can always add more complications to the story within the context of the skill challenge. Sure, you found [whatever] in the drawer; what now? What do you do now?
A bad example of an auto-fail is the "intimidate" skill use in "The Negotiation" SC presented in the DMG p76.
I will say that I don't use any "auto failure" skills. I just comment that certain skills may not apply right now, within the context of the current situation. I do encourage players to help one another brainstorm, and I throw out ideas, too, if I think they need the help (since many are new or somewhat new to the game).
Let's look at what the SC says:
Intimidate: The NPC refuses to be intimidated by the PCs. Each use of the skill earns a failure.
That description presupposes that the PC is using the intimidate skill to intimidate the NPC into action.
Let's look at what the Setup for the SC actually was:
Setup: For the NPC to provide assistance, the PCs need to convince him or her of their trustworthiness and that their cause helps the NPC in some way.
What if the player describes the following? "I want to use intimidate. I want to show the NPC that I'm so intimidating that sending me against his enemies would only serve his purposes by making them fear him". In that instance I see no reason why the use of intimidate would be an automatic failure. This is where I think SCs went astray, they tried to codify too much. Give the DM some NPC motivations, some scene props, a worthwhile goal and let the DM improvise where needed as needed.
I agree. Since I don't follow this advice when I run them, I don't think it's too much of an issue. I might say "there's nobody for you to Intimidate", but I'm generally pretty lenient. I've let the Monk do things like use Insight to predict the cave's path, since it was kinda maze-like, since it had been designed, even though there was nobody present to use it on. I'm not going to say "these skills always fail," and I basically wing every skill challenge, instead of deciding what can/can't be used ahead of time.
I like to describe ECs more like action scenes in a movie. If I can make the EC feel like I felt while watching the movie then I'm pretty pleased. Unfortunately a lot of action movies have a single protagonist, and not an ensemble cast. So I have to look at all the actions as if they were being performed by 4-6 characters instead of 1-2. There are two things that are very important in an EC. The ultimate goal but more importantly the consequences of the fail. I think that the consequences of the fail are so important that they should be the first thing examined.
If you look at a movie like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom you can see how to frame ECs and keep them exciting and organic. As an example let's use the most obvious EC, the mine cart scene. The obvious goal is to use the carts to escape from the mine. However the "real goal" is to escape from the mines. It does not matter if you use the carts, or not. So what would be the consequence of failing on this challenge. The most obvious answer is that they would not make it out of the mines. After all they did not accomplish the "goal" which was to escape from the mines. However, that is where most DMs fail to understand the framework. If the PCs fail to make it out of the mines the adventure ends. So the real goal is to make it as far as possible out of the mines. The consequences of failing is that you are further away from the exit when the thing caves in (possibly taking more damage).
I haven't seen the movie, so I'm not sure why the adventure would necessarily end. Maybe it would; I don't know.
Either way, I just ran a "exit the collapsing cave" type of skill challenge. If they had failed, they'd've been stuck inside when it caved in. It would've hurt, and they would now need to somehow get out. I don't see why the adventure would end. Regardless, I rarely use skill challenges that would explicitly kill PCs if they fail, and I've not done so in 4e. I'm following the "they should never end the adventure" advice.
[SNIP example]
If everything would have gone their way they would have made it out with minimal loss of resources (surges). Since they failed they ended up deeper in the mines, and lost surges as they got out, and the water rushed out. They then had to fight with the cultist before the bridge (with limited resources). This is a fight with minions. Then comes the fight on the bridge. The fight on the bridge can even be another Encounter Challenge. If they had beat the EC they could have avoided the fight with the minions before the bridge or even made it across the bridge before any encounter.
I don't think I'm far from this at all. I'm also not sure if you think this ties into what the player dislikes about skill challenges. They have yet to fail, and I've never ended the campaign for it. If you have questions about any of the skill challenges I've run (which are detailed somewhat in this thread), I can try to answer those questions.
As you can see there is a way to make Encounter Challenges way more than simple dice rolling festivals. Presentation is the most important. Roll dice only when it's necessary. Don't make yourself a slave to the framework. I prefer to present everything from the characters POV. Some DMs don't. Try it and see how it works for you.
I don't feel like my skill challenges are "dice rolling festivals." One particular skill challenge in my second session lasted most of the session, was interrupted multiple times, and involved a lot of talking between skill checks.
I'm definitely going to explicitly tell them when they're in a skill challenge, I think, as well as what's mechanically going on (successes, failures, etc.), just as I would in combat.
I'm also going to roll dice when I feel it's necessary (someone takes an action to progress towards the end of the skill challenge, help another do so, or help reverse a failure).
And, as far as the framework goes, I'm still not sure how skipping the framework provides any benefit; how is "automatic success" more organic (or better in another way) than "you can now climb up; what do you do now?" Both of our methods rely on the fiction to progress, your method is just resolved a little sooner or easier.
And, since things rely on the fiction to progress (you can't say "I'm rolling Arcana", you say "I'm trying to magically control the harmful energies of the portal, and keep it under control"), I think I'm hitting your "presented from the point of view of the characters" note, aren't I? I'm honestly asking, not trying to shoot down all of your advice. (As you can see in this thread and the last one, I quite appreciate the advice.)
I think the main thing that helped here is the "presentation is key" bit of advice. The rest I'm not worried about, and I don't feel like there's anything to fix based on your very thorough post. I'm not sure what I need to do to present things in a way that might annoy my player less, but I'm sure there's a way to do it. I'll be keeping an eye out on how I can go about that (probably looking closer at it than I might've if you hadn't mentioned it). Thanks for such a well thought-out reply. I appreciate the effort.
