Running away skill challenge

[draquila]

I'm still pretty new to this DMing thing, and I need to design an encounter where the PCs are running away from a pack of wolves.

I take it the standard is just to make it a skill challenge, checking against Athletics or Endurance or something, and require N successes before M failures? That sounds really boring, though, it'd be completely by chance and there is no skill involved. Also, would you have everyone roll and take the worst one?

Any ideas for injecting some excitement or creativity into such an encounter?

 

[Tony Vargas]

Humanoids litterally can't outrun a pack of wolves, wolves are just faster. Wolves might well 'chase' them for a long while before attacking, to wear them down - common wolf behavior, AFAIK from the occassional nature-documentary - though.

If you want the Skill Challenge to be about escaping from the wolves, because the PCs are low enough level that they can't take them on, they'd have to reach a place of safety before the wolves exhaust them. Endurance would obviously be key. Athletics and Accrobatic could help, too - taking shortcuts by leaping streams or chasm or scampering accross a fallen tree or whatever. Nature should be a big help, since it would include understanding wolf behavior, how they track by scent, and how to lose them or scare them off - also, finding a place of relative safety, like a cave or settlement (History might help with that, too, revealing the location of an abandoned tower from an old border war or the like). Perception might help by being able to tell how far off they are.

So, as a start:

Primary Skills (moderate diff, can be rolled repeatedly)
Endurance (rolled exactly once per player, failures count - unless the party abandons the failing character)
Nature (rolled any number of times: can confuse tracks, find a path to a place of safety, discourage the wolf attack, find alternate prey that might distract the wolves, etc)


Helpful (can be used once each):
Accrobatics (can substitue for your own Endurance)
History (success counts, and reveals a place of safety)
Perception (success counts)
Athletics (can substitute for your or another's endurance)
Healing (can substitute for one /other/ character's Endurance check)
Intimidate (can only be used if the SC comes down to one last roll - at the end of the line, the party turns to fight and the wolves decide to look for easier prey).

possible outcomes:


Success: If the party used History or Nature to find a place of safety, the party reaches it before the Wolves attack, and can take an extended rest durring which the wolves leave in search of other prey. If Intimidate provided the last success, the party turns and presents a strong front as the wolves move to attack - and the wolves run off at the last moment. If the party abandoned anyone to avoid failure, that character is torn to pieces by the wolves, but the rest of the party gets away safely. Otherwise, the party is still fresh when the wolves attack (if perception was used successfully, the party is ready for the wolves, getting a surprise round), they do not need to defeat the wolves, only bloody a few of them, and the wolves flee (someone can use Nature to identify the alpha wolf, in which case, only that wolf need be bloodied to force the pack to flee).

Failure: The wolves attack when the party is on the edge of exhaustion - everyone who failed their endurance check is weakened & slowed (save ends both) at the start of the combat. If the party located a place of safety successfully, the wolves attack just before they reach safety - place the party at one edge of the map, if they move off the opposite edge, they are safe. If the party used Perception unsuccessfully, the wolves attack by surprise. If the party abandoned a character to avoid failure, that character re-joins the party just before the attack, with the wolves right behind him - and the abandoned character has lost a healing surge. If the party used Nature successfully, they identify the alpha, and can get the wolves to flee if they bloody the alpha and make a successful intimidate check against it. If all else fails, the pack flees if all the remaining wolves are bloodied. (unless they're just starving or rabid or demonic or something and will all fight to the death)


One last thought: Let the party decline the skill challenge and just fight the wolves if they want - make it a very tough encounter, though, and have the wolves (hungry, fresh, vicious and confident) fight to death regardless.

 

[Camelot]

A skill challenge is actually a lot of fun, despite having not much tactical options. If you don't tell your players all the skills they can use, and just say "You are being chased by wolves, what do you do?" then they'll have lots of opportunities to think of their own ideas and roleplay a lot.

If you're going to use Tony's skill challenge ideas, also let them make some ranged attacks against the wolves to slow them down. Count a hit as a success and a miss as a failure (since it slows them down, because they can't attack and double move...unless they spend an action point), and maybe if they use an encounter power you can count it as two successes.

 

[Pickles JG]

What do you want the skill challenge to achieve?

1) Is it a punishment for some other behaviour? - going where they should not have, insulting the druid that was keeping the wolves away etc

2) Is it just for a change of pace a break from combat & interactions

3) Is it a "random" event in the wilderness where the PCs are travelling/exploring

Any skill challenge should have the consequences for failure built into it - anytime you make players roll dice you should consider the consequences of failure as well as success or you might as well determine the result yourself.

Anyway the consequences would be different in the cases outlined above. If the skill challenge is punishment then the way outlined by Tony Vargas looks good with the wolves attacking a weakened party if they fail. (But if the PCs see this as the likely outcome they may just fight straight away to avoid the risk of being weaknened)

If the encounter is for a change of pace then you can essentually break my rule. The point is to get players to come up with cool ways of avoiding the wolves & have fun narrating this. The consequences of failure can be trival - the wolves steal some rations/eat one of your animals maybe cost a healing surge as you get tired escaping when they find easier prey.

If it's the third option you are somewhere in between. You probably want to avoid having a huge uphill fight but the penalties would be more severe than in 2- inability to take an extended rest & loss of surges as you fight off the wolves a few at a time & keep pushing on to the limits of your endurance. This works better in the context of wilderness survival in general where there are other pressures on the party's resources.

 

[jbear]

Making the person who is worst at a skill make the skill check on behalf of the party is a rubbish idea. That's a piece of advice you will want to ignore. It punishes not only the player, the group, the character but even worse, it doesn't give the guy who is good at that skill a chance to put his hand up to say 'it's okay guys, I'll handle this one'.

From what I have learnt from my experiences with physical challenges like this, everyone should be involved. PCs good at that stuff should have a chance to shine. They should also be able to help out those weaker in those areas. If I was dropped into the wilderness from a helicopter, I'd probably die fairly quickly. If I went into the wilderness with Scout Leader Billy, Billy would find ways to keep me alive, and more than that, he'd tell me how to be useful. But I'd have to do my part, it wouldn't all be up to Billy either, he could only do so much.

So PCs who suck at it should have a chance to succeed if they are lucky, but there needs to be some mechanism involved that skilled PCs can bail them out when the put there foot in it.

Tony's idea to include helpful skills that PCs can use to substitute endurance once during the challenge is a nice take on it.

What I do when I consider all PCs need to pass a certain part of a challenge 'individually', is have what I call a 'team check'. Everyone rolls. Say you have 5 players, if 4 out of 5 of them succeed it gains a success. They may or may not have to resolve that individual failure depending on the situation. That doesn't affect the challenge as such, but the PCs need to deal with the situation before than can carry on (or they are prepared to abandon their friends as Tony suggests they might want to do... a little harsh but hey!)

If 3 out of 5 succeed then it's neither a success or a failure, but something has happened. The PCs will need to deal with that something. The 2 who failed are the PCs in the most danger.

If 2 out of 5 succeed then it's a failure and the PCs are momentarily in trouble. In my opinion a failure should always change the situation, complicating things further for your PCs. The PCs need to get out of the situation as best they can before being able to proceed on their way. This situation should be more difficult than either of the other above situations. With wolves this might lead to them liking their chances to bring down one of the PCs who failed their check. maybe they have been momentarily separated from the two who succeeded the check. Let's say they are on different sides of the river. The wolves won't flee until either one wolf is killed and the other PCs manage to make it back to the group.

To aid the weaker PCs I include the following mechanics: Lead the Way: One of the PCs can choose to take the lead. The CD is usually more difficult. But if they succeed they provide a +2 bonus to the checks of those that follow them. If they fail, well it's never good if you follow someone that leads you from the frying pan into the fire now is it? I usually come up with consequences for someone failing to lead the way. Leading should involve a risk as well. (always reward good play with bonuses or lowering the difficult of the check)

The second thing I put in place is a skill that a leader can use to allow a PC they are leading who failed the check to make a reroll. I consider that these are extreme exertions of energy that require the person who rerolls to spend a HSurge. Depending on the situation I also limit the amount of times this is allowed.

As for your specific challenge, why don't you imagine the terrain the PCs are actually travelling through. Are there any tunnel like caves in the hills they could crawl through, a river with a rotten rope bridge they could cross, a waterfall to jump over. Trees they can climb to sleep in during the night, other animals they can hunt down and sacrifice to the hungry wolves?

I scribble little 'pick-path maps so I can visualise where the PCs are going on the challenge and what options open up if they go a certain way as opposed to another, and dangers at each part should they gain a fail at each point.

Skill challenges are meant to be simple, but unless you are a genius of improvisation, I find they take a decent amount of thought and preparation in order for them to become memorable and actually challenging. One of the secrets of improvisation is that the best improvisers are usually thoroughly prepared. You don't know exactly what your players are going to do, but if they do this then this happens, if they do that then that. That way when you've got nothing, you've always got something to springboard from that will hopefully lead you to a good idea, or a base to work form to handle a situation you have invented on the fly.

 

[Mengu]

What exactly is the goal? Perhaps you don't really need a skill challenge but just a group skill check for endurance. If half the party or more succeed, the group outruns the wolves. If over half the party fail, the wolves catch up to them, and there is a fight. Either way, those who failed their endurance check lose a healing surge.

Sometimes simple and to the point is all you need.

But if there is more to this challenge than meets the eye, you could make it a more sophisticated mechanic. For instance you are trying to set the mood with a chase through a Fangorn or Mirkwood like forest, as PC's recognize historic landmarks, dodge magical traps setup by evil fairies, and are supposed to pick up clues about what's to come next, during this (otherwise meaningless) chase, then you can start adding story elements and turning it into a skill challenge.

If all you need to know is, are the PC's able to out-maneuver or outlast the wolves, or are they going to have to fight, one group check will just (pun alert!) cut to the chase.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Yep, jbear, that's exactly what I had in mind when I suggested multiple 'helper' skills that could sub for Endurance. If you call for a skill check from everyone in a challenge, you are virtually guaranteeing some failures and making the skill challenge /much/ harder.

Another alternative in this sort of challenge is to call for an Endurance check from everyone, and those who fail lose a surge. No effect on the success/failure of the Challenge. I didn't suggest that, because I pictured escaping from a pack of wolves to be a very endurance-centric challenge.

 

[nookiemonster]

I'd allow different skills to be appropriate. Endurance: the character is able to help one of the other characters by carrying gear or even the character himself when the character is winded. Athletics: The character is able to run faster or even help the party through difficult terrain. Nature: you know how to move through the forest rapidly. Stealth: you throw the wolves off your scent. Bluff: you figure out a way to confuse the wolves or think that there are more of you than there are, making them more cautious to attack. Religion: you pray for divine intervention to save you!

 

[draquila]

OK so in the end I went for something quite different and convoluted, and was moderately successful.

I made a stack of cards, on them I printed

• grassland
• woods
• jagged rocks
• etc..

I dealt out 10 of these cards face-down and the players start at one end. Each round, the players reveal one card ahead of them. Based on the terrain, certain skills were required to traverse the card. E.g. athletics, endurance for grassland; nature, acrobatics for woods; etc.

My players are all D&D newbies, so I printed the skills and DCs on the cards.

Players may opt to aid another (-4 penalty to their own roll, +4 to ally's roll), rest (+2 their next roll), or try to move forward.

The wolves started 3 turns behind and moved forward a tile every other round.

If the players reached the final tile before the wolves they were safe. If the wolves reached a player, a combat encounter ensued.

In my game almost all the players reached safety, except for the fighter who decided to hang back to chop down trees in the woods to slow the wolves, and the warlord who actually moved backwards to aid the wizard. The wolves caught up with them and the rest of the party had to come back to help the fight. It was a really hard encounter because the party was mostly out of healing surges (that's why they're running in the first place) but they managed to fight off the wolves.

All in all it was fun, but getting all the players to make strategic decisions about what skill to use, whether to help others, and so on took quite a bit of time and it didn't feel so much like a chase as a puzzle. And the fighter and warlord was unconscious for most of the fight, so they got a little bored Not sure how I could've handled that better.

 

[Camelot]

That's a really creative idea! Plans never turn out the way they're intended, every game is bound to have some slow spots. It sounds like the fighter brought it upon himself if he decided to stay back, but you probably should have slowed down the wolves a lot because chopping down trees is a darn creative idea.

You also could have made branching paths so that the PCs would have more options, instead of just a straight line. Then they could choose which way to go depending on their skills. "I'm going through the forest; I can navigate it better!" "Well, I can't, so I'll take the grassy path and meet you at the rocky hill!"