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

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 5414115" data-attributes="member: 2067">OH! OH! OH!*raises hand and waves it around*ME! ME! ME!I'd like to see a D&D that zooms out a little bit and focuses on the challenge of the dungeon at least as much as the challenge of the combat. The skills system in D&D currently exists to solve three types of problems:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> Learning Information: Knowledge skills and interaction skills like Streetwise reveal information. The DC's of these skills are generally set by the difficulty of observing this (or skills like Stealth or Bluff in certain cases)</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> Navigating Terrain: Mobility skills like Nature and Athletics govern how you get from Point A to Point B, and overcome obstacles in the way. The DC's of these skills are generally set by the terrain and obstacles you're facing. </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> Convincing Others: Social skills like Bluff and Diplomacy govern how you affect the attitudes of NPC's. The DC's of these skills are generally set by the stubbornness of the NPC's you're up against (or the use of these same skills). </li> </ul>All you need to do is expand those three basic "adventuring challenges" into things that Consume Resources (such as healing surges or daily powers...they must be replenishable, but they must be long-term), Have High Stakes (TPKs and ultimate failures, deaths and destruction, not just "oops, gonna hafta fight!"), and Allow Predictable Outcomes (Mostly, anyway...you know when you do X, your enemy will try to do Y, but there's an element of chance..ie dice rolling...that comes into play...aka: mechanics).So, basically, what I would put in a PHB to more broadly emphasize things outside of an individual encounter would be, basically, class abilities that meet those three criteria.I'm sure you can imagine a few right now. I'd add to that DM guidelines for encounter layout in a dungeon, words of advice on different plotting and design techniques (dialog mapping, the dungeon as a flowchart, basic three-act structure, how options give meaning to actions, advice for pacing, etc.). So you'd have a DM who presents a dungeon that makes use of the abilities that a player gets, and the risk wouldn't be "Do I die in this encounter?", but would be more "Can I complete this dungeon?" (which includes the former question, but also includes more than JUST that question).</blockquote>

Verification