Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Manbearcat" data-source="post: 6295309" data-attributes="member: 6696971">I won't get into the rest of your post as pemerton addressed each of the mischaracterizations, caricatures, or misconceptions (whichever they might be) of the conflict resolution framework, its rules components and its guidance (and gave you some play examples...of which there are tons and tons more everywhere around here).  I'll just answer this bit.1)  As a GM, I'm not "allowing" anything.  Its happening or it isn't.  The players make decisions.  The dice get rolled.  The fictional positional evolves as a result.  2)  I've had 2 PCs die during noncombat Skill Challenges in my two 4e games that I've run.a)  The first PC died during a brutal Skill Challenge in which the 1st level PCs were slaves in the frozen north.  Their orc masters didn't have to keep security because their prison was the remoteness of the location (similar to the Russian Gulags).  The harshness of the locale meant almost certain death to anyone "escaping."  One morning, the PCs woke to find the entirety of the camp empty and a complete blizzard, white-out going on.  They faced a complexity 5 Skill Challenge to locate civilization and earn themselves an Extended Rest (forbidden to them until they succeeded in the Skill Challenge).  Failure meant (i) healing surge loss and either (ii) an attack by a disease/condition or (iii) an encounter with a hazard or a combat.  Ultimate failure in the Skill Challenge meant that the PCs lost 2 healing surges apiece and had to start over.  When you no longer have healing surges and you "lose a healing surge", you take 1/4 your HP in damage (healing surge equivalent).  These PCs failed their initial effort at their Skill Challenge and this caused one of the PCs to go from 1/4 HP to - 1/4 HP.  A failed Group Endurance check cost the PC its life due to exposure.  Another PC barely survived.b)  The 2nd PC died from a Remove Affliction ritual while suffering from a virulent swamp plague.  After getting lost while trying to locate a shaman/medicine man who was rumored to have the cure (failing the initial Skill Challenge to find him in the swamp), the PC had no healing surges left and was at less than half HPs (bloodied).  He needed an Extended Rest.  Unfortunately for the PC, the Extended Rest mechanics would invoke an Endurance check that would either move the disease down a stage or send the PC to the final stage; death.  The PCs felt that the drama (and the odds) were in favor of the shaman/medicine man performing the Remove Affliction Ritual.  His total Heal check for the Ritual was a 7 after adjusting for the level of the disease.  The effect on the target of such a roll is damage equal to the target's maximum HPs.  WIth less than bloodied HP value, the PC exceeded his nevagative bloodied value and died.3)  I observed the rules of the game (stridently) so I didn't have to make any rulings.  The fictional positioning was what it was and the mechanical consequences were transparent.4)  No Skill Challenge is inherently "unwinnable" if the GM is stridently observing the rules of the game.  Guidance and GMing principles will lend themselves to the application of more or less punitive fallout by the GM, but that isn't making a Skill Challenge "unwinningable."  Stakes/the point of the conflict (the question to be answered) are set out.  The situation is framed.  The conflict is resolved mechanically, the fictional positioning evolves, and the fallout or victory is earned.</blockquote>

Verification