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Am I crazy? I've just gotten a hankering to play 4e again...
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<blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 8155941" data-attributes="member: 82106"><p>I think a big part of making successful SCs is to work out the proper framing of the SC, that is what is its scope and what are the actual goals. Much like with a check, if you cannot answer questions like, "is failure interesting?" and the related, "is something at stake here?" then you probably don't have a good scope/frame for a challenge.</p><p></p><p>You have four options, you can go ahead in free RP (possibly using a few ad hoc checks, but I don't favor that technique myself), or you can shrink the scope and create a smaller and more immediate SC, or you can expand the scope and create a larger and more encompassing SC. Finally you can 'think out of the box'.</p><p></p><p>Looking at the shrinking option you need to be careful that there is still some dynamism in the challenge. An SC that involves "opening a door" is probably silly. So if the current scope is already pretty low level, then you're probably not going to want to break things down further. Normally the complexity level will help you with this. If you have a complexity one challenge sort of situation (IE immediate goals, few elements, less factors involved) then it is hard to decompose more, right? </p><p></p><p>Expanding may be possible, again you can look at complexity. A fairly abstract, strategic complexity five challenge is going to be hard to generalize further, although you might manage it in some cases. The danger here is that the challenge will simply cease to be a single coherent story. If you cannot describe the flow of your proposed challenge in some narrative terms, as a 3 or 5 act drama for example, then its probably not going to work. </p><p></p><p>'Out of the Box' is a hard thing to categorize, but I'm trying to capture the idea that maybe you're looking at things from the wrong perspective if building an SC isn't working. Think about what the actual goals of the PCs are, and how to bring new elements into the mix, or recast the situation in different terms. This can be done at any level, but obviously larger and more complicated SCs offer more ways to pull the levers. </p><p></p><p>One tried and true technique is to add a prelude. Another post talked about 'prologue' or 'preparation', well, make that a part of your SC! You can, if you're of a mindset that will allow for it, even do that in a retro fashion. For example as the party marches into the Dry Waste and begins to fail some Endurance checks, maybe one of the PCs whips out the extra water rations she wisely included in the supplies the previous day at the town. This kind of thing can allow you to portray a character with vastly more survival experience and savvy than the player might have, and make a more interesting story.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="AbdulAlhazred, post: 8155941, member: 82106"] I think a big part of making successful SCs is to work out the proper framing of the SC, that is what is its scope and what are the actual goals. Much like with a check, if you cannot answer questions like, "is failure interesting?" and the related, "is something at stake here?" then you probably don't have a good scope/frame for a challenge. You have four options, you can go ahead in free RP (possibly using a few ad hoc checks, but I don't favor that technique myself), or you can shrink the scope and create a smaller and more immediate SC, or you can expand the scope and create a larger and more encompassing SC. Finally you can 'think out of the box'. Looking at the shrinking option you need to be careful that there is still some dynamism in the challenge. An SC that involves "opening a door" is probably silly. So if the current scope is already pretty low level, then you're probably not going to want to break things down further. Normally the complexity level will help you with this. If you have a complexity one challenge sort of situation (IE immediate goals, few elements, less factors involved) then it is hard to decompose more, right? Expanding may be possible, again you can look at complexity. A fairly abstract, strategic complexity five challenge is going to be hard to generalize further, although you might manage it in some cases. The danger here is that the challenge will simply cease to be a single coherent story. If you cannot describe the flow of your proposed challenge in some narrative terms, as a 3 or 5 act drama for example, then its probably not going to work. 'Out of the Box' is a hard thing to categorize, but I'm trying to capture the idea that maybe you're looking at things from the wrong perspective if building an SC isn't working. Think about what the actual goals of the PCs are, and how to bring new elements into the mix, or recast the situation in different terms. This can be done at any level, but obviously larger and more complicated SCs offer more ways to pull the levers. One tried and true technique is to add a prelude. Another post talked about 'prologue' or 'preparation', well, make that a part of your SC! You can, if you're of a mindset that will allow for it, even do that in a retro fashion. For example as the party marches into the Dry Waste and begins to fail some Endurance checks, maybe one of the PCs whips out the extra water rations she wisely included in the supplies the previous day at the town. This kind of thing can allow you to portray a character with vastly more survival experience and savvy than the player might have, and make a more interesting story. [/QUOTE]
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Am I crazy? I've just gotten a hankering to play 4e again...
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