That was actually a class ability that a few PrC's had, not a feat. I think the Master Samurai had it in 3.0, and the Frenzied Berserker and maybe the knight protector had it in 3.5.
[WotC's recent insanity] I think I've Figured It Out
- Thread starter Mercurius
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That was actually a class ability that a few PrC's had, not a feat. I think the Master Samurai had it in 3.0, and the Frenzied Berserker and maybe the knight protector had it in 3.5.
Neonchameleon
Legend
The only times I've told players what they are going to do in my games are when they e.g. need to make balance checks to stay standing. You are posting with a caricature in part due to poor modules. (A lot of 4e fans bitch about published 4e modules and how they ignore the guidance in the DMGs)
1 is set the scene. Normally based in part on previous PC actions. This is unchanged.
2 is let the players tell you
Yes, that's why you make a skill check. Even in a skill challenge. That has not changed in 4e.
And in 4e, that whole series of events could be a skill challenge. Assuming you planned that when you went in rather than were just reacting. Or it could be a series of skill checks if you were reacting as you went.
I think at this point it would be easier to explain by giving you an example of a skill challenge I have actually used on the fly.
The whole thing started off as a combat scene with a dragonrider on a young dragon coming down to rescue a fallen ally. To cut a long story short, and through the dice gods keeping things interesting, the dragon rider killed his ally with friendly fire (rolling a natural 20 to do so). So the PCs now have a scared dragon rider and dragon and need to get them both somewhere safe to avoid trouble from above with the dragonrider's former allies, and from the city being attacked by dragons (and the rest of the army). This was in my second or third session DMing. Ever. In any edition.
The scene was set. I asked the PCs what they were going to do. And of course, they came up with a half-ludicrous PC plan. Throw the fledgeling dragon half onto a cart. Wrap blankets over it to disguise it from the air. Hold lanterns and claim it's a plague cart to keep people from investigating. How the hell do you work out which details to roll for in a plan like that and how much time to give it before it will get boring? Especially as there are hundreds of problems you could throw at a plan like that and not only wasn't the situation something I could have prepared for, even if I had I wouldn't have forseen that plan.
What would you do with a PC plan like that? For bonus marks, what would you do in your third session DMing and having to keep up with that?
My answer was simple and seemed confident (it wasn't, but it was a good enough fake). I made a mental note that this was a level 3 (the PCs were level 1 at the time), 6 or 8 success skill challenge (I forget which) and that gave me all the mechanical side I needed. I made them roll for what I considered the parts likely to fail of what they were doing (such as scavenge the cart - streetwise) and evaluated what they were trying as easy, medium, or hard (all you really need). When they failed a roll, I gave them a couple of curious street-urchins who came to investigate which opened up the rest of the social skills (the PCs got to pick how to deal with the kids of course - and bribing them would have been an automatic success). Whole thing was paced well, easy to evaluate, easy to give the XP reward, and fun for everyone without causing me to wrack my brains. (Of course I did not tell the players that I was running a skill challenge - I use them as a DM-side tool).
For that matter, Skill Challenges work very well for most insane PC plans. And I have some insane planners in my group. (I'm one when I'm not DMing.) Some way of bridging the gap between immediate skill check and mini-quest that drags out over a session or more. Skill challenges are particularly good when you have PCs working together but not in the same place - e.g. two PCs providing a distraction to allow two more to sneak in more easily. Or for group sneaking when someone's wearing heavy armour - the challenge is to keep anyone from hearing him (or bluff the guards with animal noises or just see the guards coming and hide or...)
giant.robot
Adventurer
Please give some page numbers of these rules. I haven't seen them before and I'd love to integrate them into my game! On second thought don't bother, I don't need to include your fantasy rules into the actual game.
There's nothing in the rules that match what you describe. Hell, the Dungeon Master's Book from the DM's Kit says specifically on page 171 to make sure you give players choices. On page 172 it gives railroading as an example of bad adventure design. Starting on page 203 it goes into detail about creating combat encounters. Page 224 describes skill challenges as non-combat encounters. These suggestions are such that it's actually pretty easy to build encounters on the fly. They also end up far more balanced and interesting than the 2E random encounter tables.
You're juxtaposing your DM's or your inability to prevent railroading. As I've said, the encounter design rules are easy to use on the fly. You can very easily set up an interesting encounter based on the actions of the players. There's absolutely no need to "design" all of the encounters ahead of time. You throw some monsters of the right level (usefully listed by role) into an encounter template or pick the skills needed for a skill challenge and voila, an encounter!
If this requires massive amounts of pre-planning there's not a lot to do any rules system can do to help you. All of the above should be easy to do on the fly and as a reaction to player's choices. You'll notice Paizo ported this idea to Pathfinder, I doubt they did so because it's an unworkable railroady mess. You can even ignore these design rules if you want. However as a stock design method these are actually pretty damned useful. Again, they're really helpful for new or infrequent DMs which was one of the design goals of 4E. WotC is correct in their belief that the game lives and dies by the number of DMs playing the game.
LostSoul
Adventurer
I'm running my own 4E "hack". In my game I have two explicit ways in which skill challenges are used (I'm planning on adding a third - to make magic items): social conflict and evasion & pursuit. I've never seen cause to run a skill challenge for anything else.
Anyway, I set the number of successes needed for social conflicts by making a reaction roll. For evasion & pursuit, I set the number of successes needed by making a morale check.
You can see how those are qualities of the characters involved.
It's about getting unexpected results. Using the structured skill challenges has led to unexpected results in my game.
A quick example: one PC was trying to convince some guards to turn against their master; they didn't particularly like their master (a vain, self-obsessed necromancer; that was determined by DM fiat) and they had a good opinion of the PC (determined by the reaction roll). The PC's modifier to his rolls was so high he couldn't fail (as long as he was able to apply specific skills), but I decided to follow the rules and play out the challenge.
It led to something interesting. The guards ended up asking for and getting some concessions from the PC. Without that structure I would, as DM, have gone with the "expected" result - the guards agree to the PC's demands because he's such an awe-inspiring figure.
Neonchameleon
Legend
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D'karr
Adventurer
I've put together a very rough one for magic items, and really any kind of crafting. I wrote about it a little here, and here.
I find that the "rigid" way in which the skill challenge examples were written caused a lot of confusion.
The great benefit I've found to the skill challenge framework is that it easily allows me to assign difficulty (complexity) and rewards (XP or otherwise). Everything else becomes an action/reaction, or better yet, an opportunity/reward system. It allows for a very fluid situation.
The most common "problem" I've seen among the published skill challenges is that they followed the same "rigid" presentation as the samples in the original DMG. For me, a skill challenge only "works" when it feels organic. When it has a back and forth between the DM and players (action/reaction). Someone mentioned "telling" the players what they do or what happens when they use X skill. I can understand this "disconnect" because reading the samples in the original DMG you get a sense that is how the interchange occurs.
There were "arguments" that hinged on the "fact" that you could not use intimidate on a social challenge because the example showed it as an automatic failure. What was missing in that argument was context. The example portrayed a negotiation with a Duke. I would probably say a powerful political figure. One that because of personality can't be cowed by intimidation. Therefore, using intimidation in that situation would fail because not only would he not comply, he'd probably be offended by the attempt. That doesn't mean that "every" social situation is the same. What if the challenge was to convince a local thief? The situation is not the same and the context is not the same. Those samples need to be looked at within context. I think over time WotC has done a better job of "explaining" the framework, but that is all it is, a framework. The meat of the skill challenge is still the actions of the players, and that is what should be the focus. How do "they" go about accomplishing a goal.
The goal can be set by the DM, but that is not exclusive. In my games I've used skill challenges on different occasions when the players set a goal for themselves. It provided me a way to "reward" them "appropriately" for their non-combat actions instead of coming with an ad-hoc reward that could easily become inconsistent.
DMG, pg 12: "Being a referee means that the DM stands as a mediator between the rules and the players. A player tells the DM what he wants to do, and the DM responds by telling the character what kind of check to make and mentally setting the target number."
DMG, pg 20: "Once you’re done describing the area, the players tell you what their characters want to do... Your job here is to listen to what the players want to do and identify how to resolve their actions."
DMG, pg 74, 'Running a Skill Challenge': "You describe the environment, listen to the players’ responses, let them make their skill checks, and narrate the results... Sometimes, a player tells you, 'I want to make a Diplomacy check to convince the duke that helping us is in his best interest.' That’s great—the player has told you what she’s doing and what skill she’s using to do it. Other times, a player will say, 'I want to make a Diplomacy check.' In such a case, prompt the player to give more information about how the character is using that skill."
DMG, pg 101, 'Building an Adventure': "Player and character choices must matter in a good adventure... You must give the players enough information, even in simple situations, for them to make meaningful decisions."
DMG2, pg 11-12, "Strongly plotted adventures provide players with multiple opportunities to make decisions that insert branch points into the story... Sometimes, players make unexpected choices, forcing you to improvise a suitable response. A DM who prefers to prepare every encounter before starting an adventure might try to nullify the players' choice, encouraging their return to the preplanned set of obstacles. DMs who like to improvise might use these unanticipated decision branches as opportunities to allow the players to take the story in a new direction."
DMG2, pg 83, "Like combat encounters, skill challenges work best when you and the players want one to happen.
Let's say you designed a combat encounter for your next adventure. The characters need to cross a bridge, and there's a big, hungry troll in their way. Time for a fight!
That is, unless the players decide to sneak around the troll or bribe it with a cask of fine ale. A good DM knows that sometimes it's best to take the party's crazy plan and run with it, especially if the players back up their ideas with a few rolls of 20 on Stealth or Diplomacy checks. A good DM thinks on his feet and rewards clever, interesting ideas.
The same logic applies to skill challenges. Is there a chance that a really good idea could completely trump your skill challenge? Don't fret! That's a good thing. D&D is a game about creativity and imagination. If there's only one specific, scripted path to success, you've lost what makes D&D fun. When you build a skill challenge, be prepared for it to head in a direction you didn't anticipate or for the party to fail utterly. That way, the game moves on regardless of what happens with the challenge."
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Firstly, let me say I was in that session(although the plan wasn't mine) and Neon's handling worked really well. As indeed have the number of other times I have become aware that he was running a skill challenge. (I reckon I miss loads)
Having said that, I run a 4e game myself and I really struggle with skill challenges. I suspect Neon really gets them, and I just don't.
Then again, maybe I just need to read more of the guidance on the subject.
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Mark CMG
Creative Mountain Games
A DM tells the players what their PCs perceive, allows them to act, then describes the consequences of their actions. RPGs have been like this since the 70s.
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