Essentials rules clarifications

[Colmarr]

I'll be stepping back into the DM chair (when Zeitgeist begins) after being solely a player since 4e launched. I've therefore been reading through the Rules Compendium to brush up on my DM-side knowledge.

I've come across a few things I'd like clarification on:

Non-triggered Free actions:

My understanding is that a non-triggered free action can be taken at any time, but cannot interrupt another action (because despite being free it's still an action). Eg. You could not use Divine Fortune during a charge action after moving but before you roll your attack.

Is that correct?

Triggered free actions:

My understanding is that triggered free actions are reactions unless ruling that way would invalidate the intent of the action itself, in which case they are interrupts. Eg Word of Urgency acts as an interrupt because moving the ally after the burst goes off would be pointless.

In neither case do they cost you your immediate action for that round.

Is that correct?

Skill Challenge DCs:

The updated skill challenge rules provide 'advantages' for achieving certain things, such as a success at a Hard DC counting as two successes.

The rules aren't actually clear though on how you structure the challenge. Does the check need to be against a Hard DC (thus increasing the risk of failure) for the advantage to accrue, or does it just need to beat a Hard DC?

Thanks in advance for any replies.

 

[Aulirophile]

RAW of when non-triggered free actions resolve and can occur has just as much actual rules text as always. I.e., none. Latest podcast says they cannot be taken during any other action at all..... which means you can't interrupt someone speaking. Very polite people in the 4e world. Thankfully that isn't rules text.

Correct on Triggered Free Actions. The rule is "They resolve as Reactions unless they must be Interrupts in order to function."

 

[DNH]

Latest podcast says they cannot be taken during any other action at all..... which means you can't interrupt someone speaking. Very polite people in the 4e world.

Should we start saying "Over" every time we finish speaking?

 

[eamon]

My understanding is that a non-triggered free action can be taken at any time, but cannot interrupt another action (because despite being free it's still an action). Eg. You could not use Divine Fortune during a charge action after moving but before you roll your attack.

The rules aren't fully explicit, but that seems to be the most likely, conservative approach. However, I find this interpretation to be needlessly restrictive and in any case tricky to define; what happens when a triggered action interrupts another action - can you follow with a free action? I'd run em as immediate reactions by default; that means you can react after a square of movement. That's not RAW, just personal preference - considering what free actions generally do, that's usually reasonable.

There's another quagmire with free actions, and that's free action attack powers. The rules seem clear; but they aren't as soon as you introduce non-attack power free actions that themselves trigger attacks (not that uncommon), and of course it involves extra tracking. In any case, it's largely superfluous and can be safely ignored, except for the purposes of preventing a few very specialized free-action attack power abusing builds, which you'll spot when you see them.

 

[Riastlin]

As to the SC question, I think (though could be wrong) that the intent was to leave it in the hands of the DM and the examples provided are merely that, examples. In other words, the key here is to provide the availability of certain advantages in the more complex challenges. So, in the case of a Hard DC counting as 2 successes you could, in theory, rule it either it must be made against that DC (increase likelihood of failure) or simply be enough to beat the hard DC but with a Moderate check being enough to count as a success.

Personally, in my mind its a matter of "know your group". The 11th level avenger in my group for instance has a passive perception of 30 or 31 iirc. Obviously, this makes hard DC perception checks relatively easy for him. Yet, his passive perception is far better than anyone else in the group so it could easily be a lot more difficult if he were not present for a session.

All in all, I think skill challenges are still a bit tricky to implement well, so I think the best idea is to just let your design evolve naturally based on actual experience with your group. If your group is particularly ill-suited for a given skill challenge for example, it might make sense to use the approach of make a check against a moderate DC but if the check is high enough that it would have beaten a hard DC then you get two successes. If a skill challenge should be relatively easy for your group, then feel free to go the other way.

 

[the Jester]

As to the SC question, I think (though could be wrong) that the intent was to leave it in the hands of the DM and the examples provided are merely that, examples.

Exactly. The skill challenge framework is explicitly flexible and every good skill challenge should be fairly unique.