Karui_Kage
First Post
For those of us who use a lot of modules, are there any guidelines on conversion from DnD's current 4.0 Skill Challenge system to yours? DC changes, difficulty adjustments, etc.?
Stalker0's Obsidian Skill Challenge System (Update: Version 1.1) Now with PDF!!
Karui_Kage said:
Use my system for any skill challenges of complexity 3 to 5. Take the skill challenge level, and use the chart in my system to determine the DC. For complexity 1 and 2 challenges, you may want to use a few rolls instead of a skill challenge. My system generally assumes a skill challenge is a bigger deal than a complexity 1 or 2 might indicate.
Take the normal results for succeeding at the challenge, and decide how much of that should be for a total victory or a partial one. Often times modules provide side adventures, feel free to have a partial victory tie in to those side quests.
Samurai
Adventurer
Interesting! One point, though:
Why does the relative number of successes needed drop as party size increases? In a 2 person party, you'll have 6 rolls over 3 rounds, and 5 are needed for total success. That's 2/3s of the total number of rolls. But in a 5 person party, you'll have 15 rolls, and yet only 8 of them need to succeed for total success. If you were keeping the chances the same, shouldn't it need 10 successes for a full success, which is 2/3? Are you assuming that only 1 character will be really skilled, and thus lowering the % of successes needed to account for more relatively unskilled characters? If so, that may be a mistake. Depending upon the group and the challenge, you might have almost everyone able to strongly contribute, or you might have no one at all trained in the main skill. It is very possible that in a 2 character group, neither character has the needed skill, so both are rolling untrained...
Why does the relative number of successes needed drop as party size increases? In a 2 person party, you'll have 6 rolls over 3 rounds, and 5 are needed for total success. That's 2/3s of the total number of rolls. But in a 5 person party, you'll have 15 rolls, and yet only 8 of them need to succeed for total success. If you were keeping the chances the same, shouldn't it need 10 successes for a full success, which is 2/3? Are you assuming that only 1 character will be really skilled, and thus lowering the % of successes needed to account for more relatively unskilled characters? If so, that may be a mistake. Depending upon the group and the challenge, you might have almost everyone able to strongly contribute, or you might have no one at all trained in the main skill. It is very possible that in a 2 character group, neither character has the needed skill, so both are rolling untrained...
Samurai said:
Basically a lot of factors go into choosing the target numbers. For example, its true that a 2 person party is more likely to not have the skills needed for a challenge. On the other hand, that 2 person challenge maybe 2 people out of a 5 person party that is sent on a sub-mission, in which case they are likely to be very good with skills for that challenge.
Further, in order for me to keep the ratios the same throughout, I would have had to greatly increase the target numbers so that everything would scale evenly, and the math tends to get even more variable as that number increases.
In the end, the DM is the final arbiter on what skill challenges are good for his party. Just like two brutes may be a very difficult encounter for a party of 2 controllers, throwing a social challenge at a group with no social characters is going to be very difficult, though the DM can always adjust the DC to help this along.
Stalker0, can you post your test challenges as examples? It's easier to assess your system with more material to draw from. What I'm wondering is where to draw the line between a skill challenge and normal skill checks. This KotS prequel (beware for spoilers if you haven't played it yet!) has the situation that a goblin guard keeps the gate under surveillance.
I expected that my group would discover the guard and either makes a full attack or sends the rogue to deal with the problem. But a subgroup of two people (the rogue and the wizard) tried to create a diversion and failed because of a bad roll for the wizard (despite giving him a +5 circumstantial bonus which was after later checking the wrong ruling of my part). Considering some other mistakes I made during my DMing I am inclined to repeat this part of the game (we stopped after that because time ran out) if we could work with a skill challenge.
But I am not sure if using a skill challenge is a good idea here. The first problem I see is what the success should be. Can I negotiate with my players the goal while playing? Does doing so take too much time? Makes this choosing the applicable skills more difficult? Are there other problems?
If the goal is defined, how do I know if that one can be reached in three normal skill checks or takes long enough to afford a skill challenge? Can I say that the rogue and wizard can use a skill challenge to sneak on the ground of the mansion, scale the wall and sneak to the guard without being noticed? But how can the group actually silence the guard without alerting the other goblins? Using Ghost Sound to muffle screams? Give them autocrits because the guard doesn't expect an attack?
I expected that my group would discover the guard and either makes a full attack or sends the rogue to deal with the problem. But a subgroup of two people (the rogue and the wizard) tried to create a diversion and failed because of a bad roll for the wizard (despite giving him a +5 circumstantial bonus which was after later checking the wrong ruling of my part). Considering some other mistakes I made during my DMing I am inclined to repeat this part of the game (we stopped after that because time ran out) if we could work with a skill challenge.
But I am not sure if using a skill challenge is a good idea here. The first problem I see is what the success should be. Can I negotiate with my players the goal while playing? Does doing so take too much time? Makes this choosing the applicable skills more difficult? Are there other problems?
If the goal is defined, how do I know if that one can be reached in three normal skill checks or takes long enough to afford a skill challenge? Can I say that the rogue and wizard can use a skill challenge to sneak on the ground of the mansion, scale the wall and sneak to the guard without being noticed? But how can the group actually silence the guard without alerting the other goblins? Using Ghost Sound to muffle screams? Give them autocrits because the guard doesn't expect an attack?
Loved the system in play. Used it in a physical challenge the other night:
Scene: The party has been alerted to an undead menace coming from the village cemetery; they decide to go to the cemetery during daylight when the undead are asleep and deal with it easily.
Problem: The cemetery is actually built on top of a steep, treacherous mountain which takes hours to climb.
Challenge: Climb the mountain quickly enough to make it to the cemetery before nightfall. Difficulty DC 19 (party's level 3)
Primary skills: Athletics, Endurance, Nature, Acrobatics.
Secondary skills: I allow pretty much any weird or creative use of a skill as long as you keep succeeding at it. Once you fail even once at that secondary skill, you lost your chance can't use it any more.
Synergistic skills: I don't do the +2 for primary skills, but if one skill success logically facilitates the next one, that next one gets a +2 bonus.
(Nobody in the party thought to use Action Points, or didn't think it was worth it I guess)
Round 1
The Wizard uses Perception to try to find a shortcut in the bushes. He fails, and the party sidetracks for a few hours to come to a dead end and have to backtrack. He can't search for any more shortcuts.
The Warlock uses History to see if she knows of a shortcut or a better way to ascend. She also fails, and the party has to backtrack again with zero progress. She doesn't know anything more about the mountain (can't use History any more).
The Rogue uses Acrobatics to determine the best path through the stone, which way to place your feet, where to find easy jumps, etc. He succeeds, and the party is able to make some progress thanks to mimicking his path and his movements.
The Paladin uses Endurance (with +2 thanks to the Rogue's help) to continue push everyone along at a good rate. He fails, and ends up getting tired and having to stop for a rest instead.
Round 2
Since there was more failure in the previous round than success, I introduce a complication: It begins to rain. I describe the water pouring down on the party and the path getting slippery and treacherous (no mechanical effects though, just flavor - though the situation is definitely more dire since a good chunk of the challenge has passed with only 1 success).
The Rogue continues his Acrobatics direction of the party and succeeds again. The party is able to progress some more.
The Warlock tries an Endurance (with +2 thanks to the Rogue) and fails, now she gets out of breath and has to stop.
The Wizard keeps an eye out for any wild animals with a Nature check. He succeeds and warns the Rogue just in time for him to avoid stepping into a snakes nest, saving the party considerable time.
The Paladin decides to pray to his god and ask him to stop the rain with a Religion check. He rolls a 1!
Kord, the god of battle and thunder (which coincidentally is the deity that this Paladin worships) get angry at this display of weakness and smites him. With a lightning bolt. Paladin loses a Healing Surge and can't pray any more.
Round 3
Since the last round came out even in success-failure, no more complications, but time is running out, the sun is just starting to set, and it continues to rain. I describe the day getting slowly darker just as the summit of the mountain can be seen.
The Rogue attempts to lead the rest of the way up with Acrobatics, but fails. He slips on a wet rock (by now very wet and slippery from the rain) and goes sprawling face first into the ground.
The party is now aware that they need to step it up, I make them aware of the Going for Broke rule and they decide to go for it.
The Wizard looks for any kind of natural resource they could use with Nature at +5 DC. We actually makes it and finds some herbs that the party chews and gets a boost to their energy (something like a caffeine-leaf plant I guess, lol).
The Warlock to run up the rest of the way with her newfound evergy (+2 bonus) using Athletics at +5 DC and fails. She did her best but it just wasn't enough.
The Paladin makes a last desperate attempt at pushing his friends with an Intimidate ("You better get moving or so help me I will kick your asses myself!"). He fails it. His party is just too tired from the climb to listen any more.
Result: With 5 successes out of a needed 7 to get to the cemetery during the day, it was a partial success. I described them getting to the cemetery just as the last of sunlight winked out of the sky, and seeing skeletal hands slowly rise out of the ground. However, no undead were actually waiting for them and the boss (a Deathlock Wight) was still asleep, to wake up in a couple rounds (they didn't get to know this until later though).
I should note that even though there were many failure, there was never any feeling of the DC (19) being at fault. It was always reachable and it was 100% due to low rolling that we ended up like that.
As you can see, the round-by-round structure makes it easy to keep the scene interesting and fluid by knowing when to introduce new things, and keeps a sense of progress alive instead of devolving into a string of checks. I like that very much.
One thing I noticed is that the whole thing took A LOT less time to resolve than an average combat takes us. So no way I would give the same XP; I decided to be generous and gave 1/2 the XP that a normal encounter would give (300 XP) but I think 1/3 (200 XP) or even 1/4 (150 XP) would have been more in line.
Anyway, final verdict: We like!! Very much. The whole thing was easy to follow, stimulated engagement and interest, and got the players (players who have been through a BUNCH of skill challenges already) to start thinking up creative stuff again. No easy feat let me tell you, and this wasn't even the most interesting challenge in the world . It just made the action align with everybody's 'narrative expectations' to a T, that I could tell.
I'm looking forward to tossing out some more of these tonight and if any of them turn out pareticularly interesting I'll be sure to post. Thanks Stalker0 for your hard work on it.
Scene: The party has been alerted to an undead menace coming from the village cemetery; they decide to go to the cemetery during daylight when the undead are asleep and deal with it easily.
Problem: The cemetery is actually built on top of a steep, treacherous mountain which takes hours to climb.
Challenge: Climb the mountain quickly enough to make it to the cemetery before nightfall. Difficulty DC 19 (party's level 3)
Primary skills: Athletics, Endurance, Nature, Acrobatics.
Secondary skills: I allow pretty much any weird or creative use of a skill as long as you keep succeeding at it. Once you fail even once at that secondary skill, you lost your chance can't use it any more.
Synergistic skills: I don't do the +2 for primary skills, but if one skill success logically facilitates the next one, that next one gets a +2 bonus.
(Nobody in the party thought to use Action Points, or didn't think it was worth it I guess)
Round 1
The Wizard uses Perception to try to find a shortcut in the bushes. He fails, and the party sidetracks for a few hours to come to a dead end and have to backtrack. He can't search for any more shortcuts.
The Warlock uses History to see if she knows of a shortcut or a better way to ascend. She also fails, and the party has to backtrack again with zero progress. She doesn't know anything more about the mountain (can't use History any more).
The Rogue uses Acrobatics to determine the best path through the stone, which way to place your feet, where to find easy jumps, etc. He succeeds, and the party is able to make some progress thanks to mimicking his path and his movements.
The Paladin uses Endurance (with +2 thanks to the Rogue's help) to continue push everyone along at a good rate. He fails, and ends up getting tired and having to stop for a rest instead.
Round 2
Since there was more failure in the previous round than success, I introduce a complication: It begins to rain. I describe the water pouring down on the party and the path getting slippery and treacherous (no mechanical effects though, just flavor - though the situation is definitely more dire since a good chunk of the challenge has passed with only 1 success).
The Rogue continues his Acrobatics direction of the party and succeeds again. The party is able to progress some more.
The Warlock tries an Endurance (with +2 thanks to the Rogue) and fails, now she gets out of breath and has to stop.
The Wizard keeps an eye out for any wild animals with a Nature check. He succeeds and warns the Rogue just in time for him to avoid stepping into a snakes nest, saving the party considerable time.
The Paladin decides to pray to his god and ask him to stop the rain with a Religion check. He rolls a 1!
Kord, the god of battle and thunder (which coincidentally is the deity that this Paladin worships) get angry at this display of weakness and smites him. With a lightning bolt. Paladin loses a Healing Surge and can't pray any more.Round 3
Since the last round came out even in success-failure, no more complications, but time is running out, the sun is just starting to set, and it continues to rain. I describe the day getting slowly darker just as the summit of the mountain can be seen.
The Rogue attempts to lead the rest of the way up with Acrobatics, but fails. He slips on a wet rock (by now very wet and slippery from the rain) and goes sprawling face first into the ground.
The party is now aware that they need to step it up, I make them aware of the Going for Broke rule and they decide to go for it.
The Wizard looks for any kind of natural resource they could use with Nature at +5 DC. We actually makes it and finds some herbs that the party chews and gets a boost to their energy (something like a caffeine-leaf plant I guess, lol).
The Warlock to run up the rest of the way with her newfound evergy (+2 bonus) using Athletics at +5 DC and fails. She did her best but it just wasn't enough.
The Paladin makes a last desperate attempt at pushing his friends with an Intimidate ("You better get moving or so help me I will kick your asses myself!"). He fails it. His party is just too tired from the climb to listen any more.
Result: With 5 successes out of a needed 7 to get to the cemetery during the day, it was a partial success. I described them getting to the cemetery just as the last of sunlight winked out of the sky, and seeing skeletal hands slowly rise out of the ground. However, no undead were actually waiting for them and the boss (a Deathlock Wight) was still asleep, to wake up in a couple rounds (they didn't get to know this until later though).
I should note that even though there were many failure, there was never any feeling of the DC (19) being at fault. It was always reachable and it was 100% due to low rolling that we ended up like that.
As you can see, the round-by-round structure makes it easy to keep the scene interesting and fluid by knowing when to introduce new things, and keeps a sense of progress alive instead of devolving into a string of checks. I like that very much.
One thing I noticed is that the whole thing took A LOT less time to resolve than an average combat takes us. So no way I would give the same XP; I decided to be generous and gave 1/2 the XP that a normal encounter would give (300 XP) but I think 1/3 (200 XP) or even 1/4 (150 XP) would have been more in line.
Anyway, final verdict: We like!! Very much. The whole thing was easy to follow, stimulated engagement and interest, and got the players (players who have been through a BUNCH of skill challenges already) to start thinking up creative stuff again. No easy feat let me tell you, and this wasn't even the most interesting challenge in the world
. It just made the action align with everybody's 'narrative expectations' to a T, that I could tell.I'm looking forward to tossing out some more of these tonight and if any of them turn out pareticularly interesting I'll be sure to post. Thanks Stalker0 for your hard work on it.
Thank you so much for this! I have a request though. I love Bold recovery and Going for broke, as they are tactical options. Can you add a few more tactical options like that without breaking the maths? It would be a real boon to players who love tactically meaningful choices and choose to play dnd for just that reason.
Again -- thanks a lot!
Again -- thanks a lot!
The_Warlock
Explorer
Just wanted to say, I'm not fond of 4E overall, nor of several of it's subsystems - however, I find this to be a gem. I've done complex, group assistive skill based scenes in many games through the years, mostly winging things on my end while offering the illusion of structure to my players.
I find this interpretation of a group challenge to be fabulous. It reminds me of a much more group interactive many times evolved "Complex Skill Check" from the old Alternity game by TSR. And much smoother and polished.
While I don't intend to play or DM 4e, there's good odds this will see use in anything I run that uses a 20 sided die. Thanks for the excellent work.
(PS: And if it was possible to file enough serial numbers off and release it under the OGL on RPGNow...I'd buy it tomorrow. Just saying)
I find this interpretation of a group challenge to be fabulous. It reminds me of a much more group interactive many times evolved "Complex Skill Check" from the old Alternity game by TSR. And much smoother and polished.
While I don't intend to play or DM 4e, there's good odds this will see use in anything I run that uses a 20 sided die. Thanks for the excellent work.
(PS: And if it was possible to file enough serial numbers off and release it under the OGL on RPGNow...I'd buy it tomorrow. Just saying)
Verequus said:
In general, the question of whether something should be a skill challenge is a DM preference. Some DMs will want to use skill challenges all the time, some only once in a while. The system handles both, though I recommend not making every scenario that involves skills a skill challenges.
One thing a skill challenge is particularly good at is summing up a series of events into a single encounter. For example, if your sneaking past one guard, that could be done with a single check. However, if your party is sneaking past several groups of guards, its far quicker and easier to run one skill challenge as opposed to going through each and every guard encounter separately.
For this encounter, if you want to make it a skill challenge, here's a suggestion:
Sneak Past the Guard (Physical)
The party must sneak past the goblin watchman or risk alerting the entire camp to their presence.
Primary Skill: Stealth
Challenge: Equal to the party's level.
Failure: The guard alerts the goblin camp to the party's presence.
Partial Victory: The party manages to sneak past the guard, but not perfectly, and the guard is on high alert for the next several hours. The party will suffer a -1 to checks if they have to get past him again.
Victory: The party sneaks past with no problem.
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