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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jeff Wilder" data-source="post: 1868658" data-attributes="member: 5122">If a non-combat encounter is a challenge that the players can or must overcome in furtherance of the adventure, I reward based on the CR system, but generally with an ad hoc discount based on the importance of the encounter and the risk.  Generally speaking, an encounter in furtherance of the plot gets about 25% of the appropriate EL for the group.  (I.e., a 7th-level group would average 25% of the XP they'd get for defeating a CR 7 combat encounter.)One thing I've been careful to do with non-combat encounters is to make sure that they don't hinge on only one or two rolls, which if especially lucky or unlucky can make the encounter too easy or difficult.  Combat encounters generally require several rounds of d20izing before a victor emerges ... I've started trying to make sure the same is true of my non-combat encounters.Another thing I've started doing is sometimes requiring two or more different approaches to dealing with a given NPC.  E.g., Gregson the shady jeweler-fence may need to be Diplomacized into buying the parties very hot stolen merchandise, then Intimidated into not telling anyone who asked who sold him the loot.I also occasionally give my NPCs their own angles they're working on the PCs; the difficulty with this is that I very much dislike having the dice tell a PC how he or she feels about a given situation or person.  DMs who share that reservation will need to learn how to hide behind a poker face, or even how to subtly project (possibly false) information through body language for the clever players to pick up on.  It's a difficult skill to master without a lot of practice, so in most games the PCs have a much greater upper-hand in the social arena than they probably should.</blockquote>

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