Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
The
VOIDRUNNER'S CODEX
is coming! Explore new worlds, fight oppressive empires, fend off fearsome aliens, and wield deadly psionics with this comprehensive boxed set expansion for 5E and A5E!
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Change the Situation (Skill Challenges)!
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 7117450" data-attributes="member: 82106"><p>Yeah, mostly I think that "some guys appear at the gate" through "the guards may agree to a duel to see if you're worthy to enter" (I'm paraphrasing your SC a bit here) is a rather small amount of narrative distance. The scenery hasn't changed, nothing seems to have entered or left the scene, etc. So maybe its more like complexity 2. I don't consider complexity and DIFFICULTY to be the same thing, which is one thing people often have a problem differentiating. Difficulty in an SC is gated mostly by the SC's level. Now, more complex SCs will generally be harder, but the complexity of the SC relates more to how many elements the GM needs to incorporate. A C5 is an SC that probably has at least 2 distinct parts, and maybe more, with significant changes happening such that probably only the end goal is consistent throughout.</p><p></p><p>A C5 might be something like:</p><p></p><p>Steal the Heart of the Mountain</p><p></p><p>The Goblin King prizes the great gem Heart of the Mountain more than anything else he possesses. The party has engineered a way to steal this fantastic prize. Grebuttz Iron Knife took your potion of invisibility and agreed to deliver the gem at the agreed point, where you promised to deliver to him a great reward of 500 gold pieces and a magic dagger. The challenge consists of sneaking into the mine, insuring that Grebuttz actually makes good on his end of the bargain, and leaving again, all without alerting the Goblin King or his minions, who will surely appear in their countless 1000's to deal with any intruders.</p><p></p><p>Mechanically this is a complexity 5 SC. Athletics, Acrobatics, Stealth, Perception, and Dungeoneering can all be considered primary skills. Obstacles on the way in consist of goblin patrols, unstable mine shafts, a cave full of bats, etc. One failure during this phase means signs are left or suspicious sounds are generated that the GM is likely to use later when creating hard DCs or other obstacles on the way out. A failure during the meeting phase indicates that Grebuttz is spooked and attempts to run with the gem, requiring quick action of whatever sort. Once 2 failures have been reached at this point, the Goblin King's chief underling, Urgob Big Knuckles shows up with a mining golem and about 50 of troops. The remainder of the SC consists of the golem collapsing mine shafts and the party fleeing the consequences, with Urbob and Co close on their heels. </p><p></p><p>I'll leave off a list of the different obstacles and bits of scenery and props that will likely appear at various points. The players can always bring these sorts of things into play as they desire, with most of them being standard 'old mine' stuff right out of "Treasure of the Sierra Madre" or whatever. Mining carts on rails with switches in the lines that send the cart careening off a long fall, parallel sets of tracks and multiple cars with jumping back and forth, collapsing ceilings, floors, etc, flooded tunnels, whatever needs to be dreamed up to create the requisite number of checks.</p><p></p><p>That, IMHO is a complexity 5 challenge.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="AbdulAlhazred, post: 7117450, member: 82106"] Yeah, mostly I think that "some guys appear at the gate" through "the guards may agree to a duel to see if you're worthy to enter" (I'm paraphrasing your SC a bit here) is a rather small amount of narrative distance. The scenery hasn't changed, nothing seems to have entered or left the scene, etc. So maybe its more like complexity 2. I don't consider complexity and DIFFICULTY to be the same thing, which is one thing people often have a problem differentiating. Difficulty in an SC is gated mostly by the SC's level. Now, more complex SCs will generally be harder, but the complexity of the SC relates more to how many elements the GM needs to incorporate. A C5 is an SC that probably has at least 2 distinct parts, and maybe more, with significant changes happening such that probably only the end goal is consistent throughout. A C5 might be something like: Steal the Heart of the Mountain The Goblin King prizes the great gem Heart of the Mountain more than anything else he possesses. The party has engineered a way to steal this fantastic prize. Grebuttz Iron Knife took your potion of invisibility and agreed to deliver the gem at the agreed point, where you promised to deliver to him a great reward of 500 gold pieces and a magic dagger. The challenge consists of sneaking into the mine, insuring that Grebuttz actually makes good on his end of the bargain, and leaving again, all without alerting the Goblin King or his minions, who will surely appear in their countless 1000's to deal with any intruders. Mechanically this is a complexity 5 SC. Athletics, Acrobatics, Stealth, Perception, and Dungeoneering can all be considered primary skills. Obstacles on the way in consist of goblin patrols, unstable mine shafts, a cave full of bats, etc. One failure during this phase means signs are left or suspicious sounds are generated that the GM is likely to use later when creating hard DCs or other obstacles on the way out. A failure during the meeting phase indicates that Grebuttz is spooked and attempts to run with the gem, requiring quick action of whatever sort. Once 2 failures have been reached at this point, the Goblin King's chief underling, Urgob Big Knuckles shows up with a mining golem and about 50 of troops. The remainder of the SC consists of the golem collapsing mine shafts and the party fleeing the consequences, with Urbob and Co close on their heels. I'll leave off a list of the different obstacles and bits of scenery and props that will likely appear at various points. The players can always bring these sorts of things into play as they desire, with most of them being standard 'old mine' stuff right out of "Treasure of the Sierra Madre" or whatever. Mining carts on rails with switches in the lines that send the cart careening off a long fall, parallel sets of tracks and multiple cars with jumping back and forth, collapsing ceilings, floors, etc, flooded tunnels, whatever needs to be dreamed up to create the requisite number of checks. That, IMHO is a complexity 5 challenge. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Change the Situation (Skill Challenges)!
Top