Checks v. Challenges?

[TikkchikFenTikktikk]

All of the skill challenge examples in the DMG can be--and probably were in previous editions--simply role-played with no dice rolling or solved with a single roll of a skill check.

Where do you draw the line between skill checks and skill challenges in your games?

I tend to lean towards using skill challenges since it provides more tension, creates more opportunity for role-playing, and provides more XP.

Also, do you award XP for successful skill checks, especially creative ones? I've been giving out XP equal to defeating a minion of the character's level to encourage attempting actions that might fail.

 

[James McMurray]

Importance and time required, plus variability of solution and how it affects campaign continuity.

Importance: major occurrences such as bathing in the Pool of Elements in an attempt to become one with elemental Chaos or tracking down a secret that is actively hiding itself are more likely to become challenges.

Time required: If it's a single action, it will never be a skill challenge. If it's something that will take multiple tries over several weeks, it almost certainly will.

Variability: If bluff, diplomacy, and acrobatics could all play a role in solving the problem, it'll probably become a skill challenge. If multiple skills are necessary to solve it, it almost certainly will be a challenge.

Continuity: If everything falls apart if information X or route y aren't found, it will never be a skill challenge, and probably won't be a skill check. Things that important should be handed out for free or as a reward for other deeds, not left to make the campaign teeter. But we play pretty free form, so total destruction of a campaign would be hard to achieve.

If 3 of 4 factors warrant a challenge, it'll be one. Not that I actually sit and think things through like this, but that's how my instincts seem to play out when I use hindsight to figure out why I've decided what I have in the past.

The biggest one to me is Importance. If the problem and its solution aren't important (whether it be to storyline or the players) then there's no reason to waste game time rolling it out.

 

[James McMurray]

To expand on time required: that also applies to real time. If a challenge would take two sessions to play out, I'll figure out a different way to do it. We did that once already and it got pretty old, despite the challenge being interspersed with a few combats and some random events.