Good rewards and penalties for winning or losing a skill challenge

[bert1000]

This is an area that I don’t think has gotten enough attention, even with the DMG2. A lot of the published skill challenges still seem to have problematic rewards and penalties.

For instance, I see a lot of reliance on “fail and you enter combat” with the combat being a level appropriate combat. Unless there is a severe time crunch or those used resources will really make a difference in the next combats (rare), then this is just another opportunity for XP and not a penalty at all!

I’m beginning to think that skill challenges should not be used unless there is a real in game story consequence that the players and characters care about.

For a good example, the sample skill challenge in Star Wars Saga Galaxy of Intrigue has each failed skill check equal the loss of a certain amount of fellow escaped prisoners (they are killed or recaptured by the enemy). No matter what, the PCs reach an escape vehicle, but they pay a real penalty for failure on the skill challenge (especially if they got to know some of the fellow prisoners before hand), and the failure opens up new possibilities – will the recaptured prisoner blame the PCs and try to seek revenge later?

For another example, take the common “Overland Travel SC” with failure meaning loss of healing surges. This is mostly meaningless – it is not likely to really mean anything more than an earlier extended rest unless the scenario is very specific to throw a bunch of tough combats in after the SC without an extended rest (even then there isn't really a consequence unless a PC dies because of lack of healing surges they otherwise would have had). A more interesting consequence would be something like: if the PCs fail the overland SC they don’t get to where they were headed quick enough to stop [the ritual/the village from being sacked/etc.]. This makes the SC really count, and players feel a meaningful loss from losing the skill challenge (or meaningful win for beating it!). As the DMGs say, failure of a skill challenge shouldn't end an adventure, but I think it should represent the PCs goals being thwarted, delayed, etc. in a real way.

Thoughts? For me, I think this was the missing link between seeing skill challenges as just ok to making it a meaningful part of my gaming sessions. Nowadays, I almost always try to find story results for SC, and avoid game mechanics penalties and combat encounters. (I never had a big problem with the execution of the challenges themselves. I use Obsidian and find my players engage quite well when they care about the outcome.)

 

[I'm A Banana]

I’m beginning to think that skill challenges should not be used unless there is a real in game story consequence that the players and characters care about.

Abso.

Lutely.

There's gotta be something at stake in any encounter. In a combat, it's pretty obvious: you loose, you die.

In a skill challenge, it's gotta be something else. You loose, hundreds of innocents die. You loose, you might die (think: wilderness survival, or traps, or draining healing surges). You loose, you unleash Graz'zt upon the nation, people die. You loose, your friends, family, hometown, entire racial population, poof.

There needs to always be a consequence for failure, and ideally one that isn't "Okay, win in a different way now." One that is permanent, basically irrevocable, and very serious.

Like death.

 

[BenBrown]

It doesn't have to be quite that harsh. It could be "lose the challenge and you fight this bunch of enemies you were going to fight anyway all at once, rather than in two seperate groups with a short rest in between." Still, you're right. There should be consequences for failing.

 

[bert1000]

It doesn't have to be quite that harsh. It could be "lose the challenge and you fight this bunch of enemies you were going to fight anyway all at once, rather than in two seperate groups with a short rest in between." Still, you're right. There should be consequences for failing.

So, I agree that Midgets hyperbole is extreme, and the consequence doesn't and probably shouldn't be as harsh as death since (at least in Obsidian) you are meant to fail a skill challenge around 30% of the time.

But BenBrown, your example is the kind of consequence that, unless set up perfectly, I usually find to be meaningless, and that my OP was about.

Unless the combined fight is highly above level with a real chance of PC death, then the failure doesn't really have any consequences. And most published adventures I've seen, the scenario would play out like this: failure would mean a level +3 fight instead of two level +0 fights when the party has full resources. No real consequences -- level +3 is easily winable and unless there are other story consequences (e.g., the PCs need to get somewhere within a specific time period) this is not really a penalty.

Again, this points me toward some kind of story element failure, not linked to combat and healing surges, as highly necessary to make SCs meaningful.

 

[RangerWickett]

I have discovered in my own game that using skill challenges to cover hazardous travel just doesn't work. I wanted to showcase the difficulty of reaching a distant landmark without a map, and I tried to do it by giving them finite supplies a la 'Oregon Trail.' But they argued rightfully that their characters were tougher than westward bound settlers, and that if they had supply problems, they could just kill the abundant wildlife that I had described.

I tried having inclement weather, but I realized the tension of "we're cold" is kind of minimal. In combat, the party has mechanical options to let them work toward success, and their choices feel concrete -- make an attack, or move here, or heal my buddy. And your choices affect how your opponents react.

In a skill challenge, it's just too abstract. It doesn't matter whether your Nature check represents you making a good shelter, or hunting successfully, or collecting enough fire wood, because whatever you do, it's just the same mechanic: Nature check. Worse, it's not even like the environment will respond to what you do. You either succeed or fail.

Combat can be interesting because it's a back and forth. Most skill challenges -- especially intellectual and physical ones (as opposed to social ones) -- don't have a reactive foe.

I kind of feel like skill challenges try to inject mechanical tension into something that in previous editions I would just have left to interactive storytelling, often with the result of actually reducing tension and player involvement. Sadly, I'm not sure what would make for a palatable noncombat challenge mechanic.

Also, KM, pardon my language pet peevery, but it's "lose" (rhymes with ooze), not "loose" (rhymes with moose).

 

[LostSoul]

I think that failure should be tied to whatever action failed.

If you look for a shortcut through the mountains and fail, you get lost in the mountains. If you keep failing, you'll get lost in the mountains. Whatever "being lost" means. I'd throw in wandering monsters.

I don't think general overland travel really works as a skill challenge unless you have some kind of opposing force or time limit. It's not as if you can't keep trying to go somewhere. Maybe if you're trying to beat the spring thaw so the river is passable, or beat some slavers to their stronghold or something like that. For general travel you should just make regular skill checks.

I think that if you have an opposing force then the failure should be obvious based on the action the PCs are taking.

I also think that you shouldn't pre-plan the outcome of the skill challenge and you shouldn't write a list of actions that can be taken, and that a lot of 4E is set up so that players can avoid the consequences of their choices.

 

[bert1000]

There needs to always be a consequence for failure, and ideally one that isn't "Okay, win in a different way now." One that is permanent, basically irrevocable

I think this is getting close to the essence of what makes a good consequence. It's not just a different means to the same end, but something that the PCs feel permanently. Now, I don't think this has to be as world altering as your examples. But it does have to hurt a little. Harder combat (that you are expected to win anyway), loss of healing surges that don't really mean anything b/c you can just take an extended rest, etc. which are very typical in published SC just don't cut it.

 

[bert1000]

I don't think general overland travel really works as a skill challenge unless you have some kind of opposing force or time limit. It's not as if you can't keep trying to go somewhere. Maybe if you're trying to beat the spring thaw so the river is passable, or beat some slavers to their stronghold or something like that. For general travel you should just make regular skill checks.

This is exactly what I'm talking about. If the consequence is "you get lost in the mountains and have a bunch of random level appropriate encounters before finding you way" then you shouldn't do a SC. No meaningful consequences. The examples you give above are good "story consequences" I was talking about.

 

[bert1000]

I kind of feel like skill challenges try to inject mechanical tension into something that in previous editions I would just have left to interactive storytelling, often with the result of actually reducing tension and player involvement. Sadly, I'm not sure what would make for a palatable noncombat challenge mechanic.

Here's where I disagree. I feel like the mechanic is quite capable of creating tension and good scenes. BUT, only if the goal of the SC has real consequences. Sure, the PCs can find their way through the wilderness, but can they do it in 2 days less time than anyone has ever done before while evading enemy patrols because those patrols will altert an army to their presence which will cause them to take a different route and end up getting to their destination too late to delver the key piece of military intelligence? This is a great situation for a SC! Here you have an appropriate challenge for heroes and real consequences -- without the intelligence, the good guys army will be defeated...

Lots of skills can come into play -- nature, stealth, thievery, history, maybe even bluff and diplomacy.

Check out Star Wars Sags Galaxy of Intrigue for a good trick -- change up the situation every 3-5 checks (or round in Obsidian). The first 3-5 checks are about moving quickly, the next are evading a patrol they spot, the last about convincing the city guards of a city on war alert to let them in to see the king.

 

[BenBrown]

Unless the combined fight is highly above level with a real chance of PC death, then the failure doesn't really have any consequences. And most published adventures I've seen, the scenario would play out like this: failure would mean a level +3 fight instead of two level +0 fights when the party has full resources. No real consequences -- level +3 is easily winable and unless there are other story consequences (e.g., the PCs need to get somewhere within a specific time period) this is not really a penalty.

That's more of what I was thinking of--resulting fight is high enough level that there's a chance of death.

Considering that my lifetime D&D experience (starting in 1980) has included one character that's gotten above 8th level before the campaign has ended, I'm generally in favor of slightly tougher fights but fewer of them. Level faster, and maybe I might actually make it to 11th level. So combining two of the slightly higher level fight means that the resulting encounter is quite tough.

Unfortunately, having plot rather than mechanical consequences of a failed skill challenge is less likely in published adventures, since you can't have the sort of consequence that bites you in the back three adventures down the road. In a home campaign you can do that.