Skill Complications: A Combat-Like Approach to Skill Encounters

[Frostmarrow]

Escape Jail Cell DC:25 8/4
Succeed with 8 skill checks (thievery and acrobatics, suggested) to get out of imprisonment.
Slow Passage of Time
Standard: The tedium of imprisonment breaks down morale. +10 vs passive endurance. Counts as 1 failure.
Jailor Tricks
Free: The jailor racks at the steel bars to prevent sleep. The jailor serves inedible gruel. The jailor tortures nearby prisoners. +20 vs passive insight. Counts as 1 failure.
Damp Unhealthy Environment
Per encounter: The jail is disease ridden and pneumonia runs rampant. +15 vs passive heal. Test prisoners individually. Counts as 1 failure each.

Special: Tests are against the participant with the highest pertinent skill.
Failure: After an extended period of time the weakened characters are released. Could be years.

 

[FireLance]

The skill challenge should test the character's defenses. Not require more skill checks. Alternatively the skill challenge could test a certain skill+10, as if it were a defense. Or passive skill as it were.

Either of these could work. A trap is essentially a skll encounter that can test a character's defences. As for the complication rolling against a character's passive skill, it's just a matter of who rolls the dice.

Nice work on the various types of skill encounters, by the way.

 

[Pbartender]

Another idea...

Instead of a successful "counter-attack" accumulating more failures for the players (I guarantee you, someone will complain about that), have it increase the complexity of the skill challenge.

Keep the passive skill checks as "defenses" against these checks (mainly to keep the number of dice rolls down), as per Frostmarrow's examples, but replace all instances of "Counts as 1 failure." with "Increase the complexity of the skill challenge by 1."

 

[Radiating Gnome]

These are some interesting ideas. The complications are an interesting idea, but I am not sure I like the idea of permanent setbacks like failures or penalties that last until the end of the encounter. A penalty that lasts a single round is bad enough, probably.

One thing I do like is to try to somehow match the skill challenge with something that has a countdown of it's own -- something natural to the situation. So, in a chase encounter, if the PCs don't manage to win the challenge in 3 rounds of chasing, the fleeing targets reach the woods and disappear. The careening cart might reach the bottom of the hill in 4 rounds, etc.

That only becomes important if you build challenges that allow for assisting and player actions that don't produce successes and failures. I think its important to establish that timeline if most of the party feels safe making perception checks so as not to screw up the efforts of the party members with appropriate skills.

-rg

 

[Frostmarrow]

A few points.

I'd like to call the skill complication's attacks tests instead. It sounds more appropriate.

I think it's important to leave player options as wide open as possible. That's one thing I haven't liked about the official write ups. In those the author tries to anticipate what the players will do. -An excercise of sheer pointlessness. They will never get it right and just be annoying along the way. It's like a text-based CRPG that way.

I like the skill complication to roll against passive skill, because it rhymes with combat, without overlapping traps or even combat.

Other than that; let's see an example of how you envision it, FireLance. It's your baby, I just borrowed the rattle.

 

[infax]

Thanks for all the great ideas, folks.

I greatly appreciated the general concept, although I'm not sure it will be easy to improvise encounters as quickly as I improvise combats using this system. Still, it seems like it can make for an engrossing challenge for all involved.

Slander's suggestions are good. I think I have to mule over them a bit longer, though.

And FrostMarrow's examples all seem interesting applications.

I'm sure to try to use this method next time I GM (hopefully this weekend).

 

[FireLance]

Another idea...

Instead of a successful "counter-attack" accumulating more failures for the players (I guarantee you, someone will complain about that), have it increase the complexity of the skill challenge.

Since the PCs generally don't accumulate failures during the progress phase, at least one of the skill complication's "attacks" (or "tests", as suggested by Frostmarrow) in the complications phase needs to result in failures, or the PCs won't ever lose.

I also like Radiating Gnome's idea of timed challenges. Something that automatically gives the PCs a failure for each round should probably count as both of a standard skill complication's tests for the round, though.

I'll try to come up with and post another skill complication example later today.

 

[Nether Mage Ash]

I must tell you I love your idea of creating a social, skill challenge using rules equivalent to normal combat encounters. I think it makes sense and allows rules to cover both the physical attacks and the social attacks.

Personally, I would love to see it so that this is equal in terms of power as physical combat is. That way their would be two types of rule-based encounters - physical combat and social combat. They both would have their powers, their uses and their abilities. The fluff between them would work as much as rgular combat is - the player would call an action and then describe what the action is in terms of fluff, and then roll the necessary dice for that social action.

I think it could work.

All that said, I like your system, and though I haven't read it in extreme detail yet, I gotta say it is looking good. So yeah, nice job on it and I think the underlying thoughts behind it make a lot of sense and should be implemented.

I should mention, as a general thought, that the company White Wolf Publishing has something like Social Combat in their Exalted line of game. It is considered very much similar to physical combat and it allows the using of rules based on negotiation, debate, discussion and all that comes out in social interactions.

 

[FireLance]

Here's a sample write-up of a level 4 standard complication. This is more of a PC vs. environment encounter than a social encounter. While I went with a variant approach for the way in which Nature and Perception checks accumulate successes, partly to show off another possible twist for skill complications and partly because it seems to me that all the Nature and Perception in the world isn't going to help if nobody rows the boat, the level of challenge wouldn't change very much if each successful use of the skills earned one success as normal.

Rowing a Leaky Boat to Shore
Level 4 Standard Complication (XP 350)

Setup
The PCs are in a leaky boat in rough waters. Perhaps they are on a lifeboat escaping a sinking ship, or their boat hit a rock while they were navigating some rapids. The PCs must row the boat to shore before it sinks.

Progress Phase
The PCs overcome the complication once they have earned 8 successes.

Primary Skills

Athletics: On a successful DC 18 Athletics check, the PC rows the boat closer to shore. This counts as one success.

Arcana: A PC with the mage hand cantrip may make an Arcana check in place of an Athletics check.

Nature: The PC uses his knowledge of water currents to pick out the easiest path to shore. On a successful DC 18 Nature check, the next successful Athletics check earns the party an additional success. This stacks with the benefit for Perception (see below).

Perception: The PC locates the most direct path to shore. On a successful DC 18 Perception check, the next successful Athletics check earns the party an additional success. This stacks with the benefit for Nature (see above).​

Bonus Skills

Religion: A PC who worships a deity with an appropriate portfolio (e.g. nature, water or sailors) may offer a prayer to his god for assistance. On a successful DC 18 Religion check, the party earns one success. This skill can be used only once in this way during the encounter.​

Recovery Skills

Arcana: A PC who knows the make whole ritual may recite a simple incantation that temporarily plugs the holes in the boat. On a successful DC 22 Arcana check, the party does not accumulate a failure in the complications phase.

Endurance: A PC may bail water out of the boat fast enough to negate one failure with a successful DC 22 Endurance check.​

Complications Phase
The PCs fail the complication once they have accumulated 8 failures. Both of the following occur during the complications phase:

Slow Sinking
The boat takes on more water. The party automatically accumulates one failure.

Unstable Footing
A randomly selected PC must make a successful DC 18 Acrobatics check or lose his balance and be unable to act during the next progress phase. (Note: if you prefer to have the complication roll against the PC's passive Acrobatics skill, use 1d20+7 vs. 10 + PC's Acrobatics modifier).​

Failure
The boat sinks (8 - number of successes earned by the PCs) x 5 squares from shore. The PCs have to make Athletics checks to avoid drowning and to swim the rest of the way.

Upgrade to Major Complication
Increase the number of successes required by the PCs to 12, and the PCs fail once they have accumulated 6 failures. If the PCs fail, the boat sinks (12 - number of successes earned by the PCs) x 5 squares from shore. Increase XP award to 875 XP.​

 

[Frostmarrow]

I was going to say an abstract approach to measuring time left is more accomodating to widely different complications. However, reading the entry above made me see that accumulating failures at the end of each round is a great way to increase tension. Also, it makes it important that every character participate - the sooner the better. This is pretty close to the design goal.