Skill Challenges: Please stop

[Dannyalcatraz]

Just because something is an obstacle in the game system shouldn't mean that one and only one mechanical solution should be used.

Like a wizard using his intellect rather than brute force to get his barbarian buddy out from under a boulder that has trapped him.

 

[fanboy2000]

Right, so if the PCs are heavily invested in bluff, to the detriment of their athletics then they won't engage the challenge of trying to climb a mountain. They'll either move on to things that they can bluff or else it's "OK, we make a bunch of athletics checks and fail, what happens?"

Maybe I'm wrong, but I suspect there is more than one way to get up a mountain. You don't have to climb it. It's like combat, I may write a combat scenario up, but the players don't necessarily fight NPCs. It's the same thing with skill challenges, just because I prepare a skill challenge doesn't mean the players approach the problem that way.

No, but just because the DM set up a skill challenge to climb the mountain shouldn't prevent the players from saying:

"Ok, Fred and Barney are the best climbers. Let's have them co-climb up (x number of Athletics skill checks based on distance), roped together. Then, they drop ropes down to the rest of the team to pull up all of the gear and all of the team members who are lousy at climbing."

That's a skill challenge. It may not be the skill challenge the DM prepared, but it's still a skill challenge. Again, it's like combat. The DM may prepare for one kind of combat, but the players do another. And that's a problem that likely goes back to Dave Arenson's Blackmoor campaign.

 

[surfarcher]

Interesting.

My group once decided they wanted to scale a cliff, get around anticipated enemies and attack them from behind. This became a little adhoc (complexity 1) skill challenge.

Group: Bugbear Ranger, Dwarf Paladin, Eladrin Sorcerer and Human Cleric

So who had all the cool skillz for this SC? Well from memory there were only a couple of skills used!

The Sorcerer was key to their whole strategy. They come up with a plan planned based on using Sorcerous Sirocco (mainly chosen for RP and out-of-combat applications).

DM: But it's too high for Sirocco
Sorc: I'll really concentrate, it's outside of comabt, right?
DM: OK make an Arcana check
Sorc (rolls 17): 25?
DM: OK you falter a bit on the way up, but you make it to the top.
(2 successes)
Sorc: OK I'll tie off my rope and throw it down.
Ranger: And I'll climb it.
DM: Athletics check please.
Ranger (rolls): OK plus bonus is... 17?
DM: Well it's a fair climb but with the rope you make it to the to easily enough.
(3 successes)
Cleric: I tie the rope off around my waist and hold one.
Ranger: We start pulling her up.
DM: OK given her weight that isn't going to be a problem. Shemakes it to the top easily enough.
Cleric: I untie myself and we lower the rope down for the Paladin.
DM: You are going to haul a Dwarf Paladin in full Plate, with all his gear, to the top? He's heavy and he's not very good at climbing!
Paladin: We'll give it a shot! I tie it off around my waist, hold on and close my eyes!
DM: Hhmmm... OK group strength check for everyone except the Paladin.
(3 successes, one failure as the Dwarf drops 20 feet = 2d10 = 11 damage.)
Dwarf: I call up "I'm ok! Try again!"

This time they pass the group strength check, accumulating 4 successes and succeed.

So this little problem-solving event was interesting and fun to RP. The player's enjoyed it and their success ultimately gave them a surprise round with monsters arrayed for defence against approach from the opposite direction.

It was pretty small so yes two players broke the back of it. But it was group planning, group effort and group creativity that solved it. There was no boring "two players making 24 rolls to succeed".

I reckon I could do something similar, of higher complexity, with a mountain climb challenge that would be similarly interesting. But it would be more a matter of deciding how several obstacles and problems intrlock in regards to success and failure. More the tree approach. I like to present situations and see how the players resolve those situations. The mechanic is useful for tracking and planning but if it's used as an accounting tool I think that's when it's most useful.

That's not to say that an "out there, fully visible mechanic, mini-game skill challenge" can't work or will be boring. But it will take a lot of thought and planning to ensure that it's engaging, interesting... Captivating.

Anyway just my 2cp and I'm aware I've probably rambled a bit. But hopefully it's of some us to folk.

 

[Radiating Gnome]

Surfarcher, that's is an example of one of the things that I think is an unsung benfit of the SC system - it provides a structure that can be invaluable to DMs to improvise a challenge for the party that is a little more interesting that a couple of skill checks.

I start every session by checking the most-recent-update to the skill DC table and writing down the DCs at easy, medium, and hard -- and with just those three bits of data I can improvise a whole variety of things for the party when they try to go off the rails and do something creative.

I know the original poster and a lot of us in these forums are experienced DMs who could just as easily come up with a complex skill check of some sort without the scaffolding of the SC structure to work with. But for a less experienced DM who suddenly has to come up with a way to handle a situation like this one, the SC mechanic is invaluable.

I run a huge variety of skill challenges in my games -- I use them for travel, for some RP interactions, for investigative legwork, for mass battles, and anything else I can think of. I love 'em.

-rg

 

[the Jester]

Just because something is an obstacle in the game system shouldn't mean that one and only one mechanical solution should be used. Even combat should sometimes be allowed to be avoided.

Instead of climbing the mountain, maybe the PCs will walk around it. If the players come up with a way to avoid the meat and potatoes of a massive skill challenge, the DM should be flexible enough to just let a few skill rolls suffice and move on.

Sure. I don't think anyone is arguing that you should use a skill challenge for every out of combat action.

 

[KarinsDad]

Interesting.

My group once decided they wanted to scale a cliff, get around anticipated enemies and attack them from behind. This became a little adhoc (complexity 1) skill challenge.

Group: Bugbear Ranger, Dwarf Paladin, Eladrin Sorcerer and Human Cleric

...

Anyway just my 2cp and I'm aware I've probably rambled a bit. But hopefully it's of some us to folk.

The difference is that as DM, after the Sorcerer and Ranger got up, I wouldn't have bothered with the rest. The obstacle would have already been overcome.

The Dwarf would have never have fallen because his other gear would have been pulled up first and the 250 to 300 pounds of the Dwarf with armor is easily within the lift capability of the other 3 PCs. No rolls necessary.


It's interesting to me how many times DMs throw in extra skill rolls, just to see if someone will actually fail or to see if the plan works to the nth degree, and if they do fail, some penalty (like falling and damage) gets thrown in there.

To me, that's not heroic. The heroic part was coming up with a plan that worked after the first two rolls. There is no enjoyable tension with the possibility of the Dwarf falling. It's just an either / or of a die roll.


To me, this is no different than finishing a fight and there are 3 minions still on the board. I just take them off and say "Ok, you kill the other 3 quickly" and move the game on. Sure, the minions could get lucky and survive a few rounds and do a little damage (just like the Dwarf fell and took some damage), but it's anti-climatic at that point and doesn't really add to the story.

And so, I don't consider a few skills to be a skill challenge and worth any XP. I consider it to be using a few skills. The benefit the PCs got, in your example here, was that they surprised the foes who were defending from the wrong direction.

 

[surfarcher]

OK so in your opinion we shouldn't have RPed that through?

That's fine if it works for your group. My group were enjoying the problem solving and the RP. We kept playing it through well past that. There were a few other checks at those later points too.

Where did I indicate I gave them any XP for that challenge? I just used the mechanic to measure where it went - as I said it's a great accounting mechanic. Their reward was the surprise round and disarray of the opposition.

I was winging it and I like playing it loose and flexible with SCs... I like adlib in many areas, in point of fact.

So what would they have "lost" if they failed? Well I probably would have had the little ledge at the top run out short of going around their enemy. This would have meant spent HP (from the one fall) and them reaching the final encounter after dark - which could have been disadvantageous for the Cleric (human, in a ravine, no moonlight to speak of and no low light vision).

Likewise with your combat. I will often cut combat short at that point you indicated. Most of the time in fact. But there are times the players don't show any inclination towards that. Who am I to cut their fun short?

Or do you prefer to force your will on your players regardless of what they want?

Is it possible your problem lies with an inflexibility towards certain aspects of the topic? I'm reading it as though you are taking it extremely RAW and don't want to look past what you have decided. Which is fine by me, but then I'm not trying to convince you of anything. I'm merely offering my opinion and sharing my experiences for those who have some interest in the matter. I grew tired of trying to force folks to agree with me years ago.

Cheers!
Doug

 

[kaomera]

Maybe I'm wrong, but I suspect there is more than one way to get up a mountain. You don't have to climb it. It's like combat, I may write a combat scenario up, but the players don't necessarily fight NPCs. It's the same thing with skill challenges, just because I prepare a skill challenge doesn't mean the players approach the problem that way.

What I was replying to was the "you can't bluff your way up a mountain" comment. When I write up a combat encounter, the players might choose to avoid it, and that's ok, but they fight their way through most of the ones I come up with. It's kind of a base expectation that D&D has combats, and if things aren't in the PCs favor to start with then the players try and come up with ways to tilt them in their favor, which largely involves mechanics.

When I design a skill challenge, I have basically two options: I can aim it at their good skills, and they'll probably attempt it (they might avoid it, just like they might an encounter). Alternately, I can not aim it at their good skills, and they aren't going to attempt it because that's "not something their characters would do". The idea of them actually using the SC mechanics to get an advantage on the SC, and therefore win anyway, never comes up because they don't want explicit skill challenges and they don't want to know any of the mechanical stuff (beyond what their bonus on their character sheet is).

So, to me, it's like all of the real mechanical interaction happens during character creation (including leveling up), and not at the table where it might actually matter or be interesting to anyone else (or, well, maybe it's just me). There's RP and non-mechanical stuff, which is great, I just don't need to keep a tally for that. So I don't feel like there is ever any real benefit, to me, in using the SC mechanics. Tracking successes and failures behind the screen isn't fun for me and it doesn't even really work.

Typically I find that SCs hit a point where they have "grind", or even "anti-grind". Either the players have done all of the stuff that they wanted to try with their characters, and haven't gotten enough successes, and either just give up or want to know why their cool plan isn't working - and I can't point to the tally and say "well, you need two more successes..." Or, alternately, they succeed in whatever their goal was (or was supposed to be) by achieving enough successes, but they still want to do more stuff, and they want it to matter.

So it's just easier for me to break complex goals up (when the players come up with them, although I may lay the seeds), say "well, how are you going to go about accomplishing that?", and adjudicate a small, specific success or failure for a skill check. IMO SCs are supposed to feel like that, anyway, right? I know I had some confusion about that when first trying my hand at SCs out of the PHB1, and I wasn't prepared to have the individual checks seem significant in and of themselves, and it kind of sucked.

 

[surfarcher]

What I was replying to was the "you can't bluff your way up a mountain" comment. When I write up a combat encounter, the players might choose to avoid it, and that's ok, but they fight their way through most of the ones I come up with. It's kind of a base expectation that D&D has combats, and if things aren't in the PCs favor to start with then the players try and come up with ways to tilt them in their favor, which largely involves mechanics.

That might depend on who's involved and how's it's presented. If you present and open-ended situation with an objective... Doesn't it become creative problem solving?

When I design a skill challenge, I have basically two options: I can aim it at their good skills, and they'll probably attempt it (they might avoid it, just like they might an encounter). Alternately, I can not aim it at their good skills, and they aren't going to attempt it because that's "not something their characters would do". The idea of them actually using the SC mechanics to get an advantage on the SC, and therefore win anyway, never comes up because they don't want explicit skill challenges and they don't want to know any of the mechanical stuff (beyond what their bonus on their character sheet is).

There's a third option and I think part of the problem is that you don't see that option.

• Create a scenario with an abjective
• Make some notes on how the PCs could use their resources to achieve their objective
• Define meaningful consequences of success and failure
• Let the PCs decide what their actions are, you tell them the result
• Use the mechanic to figure out where they end up

To make it more complex figure out several scenarios and how those scenarios interrelate.

So, to me, it's like all of the real mechanical interaction happens during character creation (including leveling up), and not at the table where it might actually matter or be interesting to anyone else (or, well, maybe it's just me). There's RP and non-mechanical stuff, which is great, I just don't need to keep a tally for that. So I don't feel like there is ever any real benefit, to me, in using the SC mechanics. Tracking successes and failures behind the screen isn't fun for me and it doesn't even really work.

Have you tried not defining what they can do? Instead define the scenario and simply track key things you think are of value to determine some results?

 

[kaomera]

That might depend on who's involved and how's it's presented. If you present and open-ended situation with an objective... Doesn't it become creative problem solving?

There's some limit on what the PCs will / can do (or should be, I think?) in a given situation. From a strictly RP standpoint, "My Guy's A Righteous Paladin" shouldn't be punching random old ladies on the street. "My Guy's A Learned Wizard" is going to try to find ways to make use of the stuff he's read in all those weird old tomes. Ideally, IMO, "My Guy's Kind Of A Klutz" is going to try to find ways to make that relevant without annoying the rest of the group with it.

We've got mechanics to try and encourage all but the last example, I just think that maybe they've gone a bit too far (especially given the absence of that last one being in there). When the players thing "What would My Guy do?" they look in part to their character sheets for guidance. When we get to the point that the players choose an action for their characters I'm not seeing tons of variety in the choices. And without visible mechanics I can't think of many good ways to encourage them to try something different. (I've come up with mechanics that did that, but they made it clear they just weren't interested.)

I brought up the example of undead, elsewhere. The game I'm running is Dark Sun, and as a result none of the PCs have religion trained (kind of a reasonable assumption, but IMO flawed). Religion happens to be the skill you use for knowing stuff about undead in 4e. The players where a bit upset when I called for Religion checks, which I really didn't expect. I don't think it was a matter that they just didn't want to roll on a low skill, it was the whole basis of the decision no to train religion in the first place, which led them to believe that on Athas undead should be Arcana or something. I think in a way it broke the idea that their character-building decisions actually mattered.