Creative skill use in your game

[Mort]

I see the terms "through creative use of spells" all the time on these boards but I don't remember the last time someone had an example of creative skill use. I'm trying to encourage more fun skill usage from my group. So:

What are some fun, creative uses of skills that came up in your game? Either in the use itself or because it led to a fun and/or interesting result.

What are some good scenarios that encourage good/fun use of skills that you have used or would like to use?

 

[Quickleaf]

Good topic!

Let's see we had a couple in my last campaign...

Dungeoneering to determine the land acted like a sinkhole, which led to PCs breaking a damn to flood burning fields.

Perception to unlock a called shot (-4 attack) to make a shadowhunter bat drop a victim.

Nature (modified by Dexterity) to create a hunter's trap.

Thievery (modified by Intelligence) to figure out where tomb thieves would probably hide their loot, and also to interpret thieves' cant.

Arcana/History/Religion revealing slightly different takes on the same monster, a strigha of legend.

Bluff to lure the strigha out of concealment temporarily.

Religion (with expenditure of Channel Divinity) to help a ghost move on to the afterlife.

Acrobatics on a shifting bridge puzzle/hazard to distribute weight son ridge doesn't tilt - it was easier for the gnome.

 

[Mort]

I'm going to give this a bump as I'm disappointed there has only been one response. (which surprised me a bit).

 

[Herobizkit]

With the advent of 3.x, skills are what they are and do what they do. It's difficult to have a 'creative' use for a skill that only does one or two specific things.

 

[Mort]

With the advent of 3.x, skills are what they are and do what they do. It's difficult to have a 'creative' use for a skill that only does one or two specific things.

creative does not (alsways or even often) mean used in an odd unintended way or a way not intended by the rules. Using skills exactly as intended can and should lead to fun results[edit: to be clear, I'm not talking about "creative" in the "abused the heck out of the skill for "winning" results -that is often used in these situation]:

From a (vaguely remembered prior 3.5 campaign)

Knowledge: nature - to know that the forrest seems off in some way and that something has recently disturbed it.

Perception or search: to find the green dragon lair that has recently disturbed this forrest.

Diplomacy with the dragon: to convince it to lair in an enemy territory.

From a more recent campaign:

Knowledge nobility and royalty: to ferret out that the coat of arms used by a purported noble was off and eventually determined to be an imposter and a fake!

Knowledge Religion: to determine that the supposed high priestess was faking it leading to the realization she was actually an imposter that had murdered the actual priestess!

Skills are what they are and do what they do - yes, but if they do not lead to fun interesting results, isn't something missing?

 

[JamesonCourage]

I'm not sure which uses of these skills are any more creative than is expected in gameplay. These uses seem pretty standard for the skills they are. Skills are useful when used as written.

A few sessions ago, I had a player that had Jump at full ranks want to kick off of a wall to grab a flying opponent (who was only about 6 feet over his head). That isn't covered in the rules, but I let him make a difficult check (he made it). He grappled the opponent, which pushed it to a medium load, which caused the creature to not be able to fly. This allowed the other warrior on foot to reach it and start in on it, too.

Is this the sort of thing you're looking for?

 

[Mort]

I'm not sure which uses of these skills are any more creative than is expected in gameplay. These uses seem pretty standard for the skills they are. Skills are useful when used as written.

Yes, skills are useful when used as written - the question then becomes what situations do you write into your games/come up in play where skill use leads to fun situations. Perhaps "creative" was not the best word and I should have phrased it:

What situations have you placed in your game/or have simply come up that led to fun skill usage?

A few sessions ago, I had a player that had Jump at full ranks want to kick off of a wall to grab a flying opponent (who was only about 6 feet over his head). That isn't covered in the rules, but I let him make a difficult check (he made it). He grappled the opponent, which pushed it to a medium load, which caused the creature to not be able to fly. This allowed the other warrior on foot to reach it and start in on it, too.

Is this the sort of thing you're looking for?

Yes, though "not being in the rules" is not a requirement. Again the question is what fun situations have you come up with to utalize the skill system?

 

[JamesonCourage]

Yes, skills are useful when used as written - the question then becomes what situations do you write into your games/come up in play where skill use leads to fun situations. Perhaps "creative" was not the best word and I should have phrased it:

Yes, though "not being in the rules" is not a requirement. Again the question is what fun situations have you come up with to utalize the skill system?

Ah, I understand now. Thank you for clarifying for me.

What situations have you placed in your game/or have simply come up that led to fun skill usage?

That is an interesting question. I'll think on it, and I am interested what other people have used.

 

[pemerton]

Interesting skill uses I can recall from my 4e game:

*Using Athletics to jump over a hyena pack which was blocking the 10' wide corridor, in order to relieve the pressure on the paladin who had become isolated on the other side of the swarm.

*Using Arcana to "minionize" an isolated NPC, so that he could then be killed with a single magic missile.

*When a temple was collapsing due to the destructive magical forces of a thwarted ritual, using Arcana to control the extent of the collapse, so that the whole mountainside didn't go down with the temple.

*Using Arcana, in combination with a statue of the Summer Queen, to dispel a black dragon's darkness aura.

*Using Arcana, when casting area fire spells while fighting in a library, to stop the scrolls and books from catching on fire.

*Many amusing Bluffs to create a diversion to hide, from the Sorcerer-multiclass-Cuthroat (not especially creative, but the player generally manages to get a laugh).

*Using Intimidate to hold off a wolf-riding goblin long enough for weaker allies to run to safety behind a pallisade.

*Using Religion to seek guidance, to purify statues dedicated to evil gods/demons, and to curse a wight in combat so as to gain combat advantage against it (not all this is especially creative, but it creates a nice opportunity to inflict psychical backlash if the skill roll fails).

*Using Stealth and Thievery to cache some items in a hidey-hole when having travelled back in time, so that they could be extracted from the hidey-hole once the PC returned to the present.

 

[Hussar]

From our 4e game:

Using Arcana to open a magically locked door instead of thievery.

Using Religion to open a lock with a (possibly holy) spoon by tapping on the lock and praying.

Using Religion to come up with a quick ritual, combined with a bit of radiant damage, to prevent the rising of newly created undead.

Using Acana to speak to the spirits of the wild to guide the group after they got lost. (might have been religion, I forget now)

Note, all of these uses were player generated and not actually part of the adventure.