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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Manbearcat" data-source="post: 6040464" data-attributes="member: 6696971">I'm not sure if you're referring to some of the Exploration Skill Challenges that I've run as I've detailed them in various threads (or if you've seen this in games yourself).  I believe Dkarr has done something similar to what I've outlined.  In 5e it would be more difficult with the varying resource schemes.  4e makes it simple as you can create a Condition Track whereby advancing through the track progressively takes away your ability to refresh resources (Healing Surges, Dailies, and finally Encounter Powers).  However, with 5e, we have completely disparate resource schemes so it would be difficult for a Condition Track to effectively impose upon a group and provoke the requisite tension/desperation.  However, the Hit Die mechanic would be functional in such a framework.  Further Background Traits could be leveraged quite well to move the narrative along with an auto-success.  For instance, you have a Bounty Hunter and a Guide amidst your group and you're looking for someone of infamy (outlaw, hag, shaman, oracle) deep in a swamp or forestland.  The Bounty Hunter could invoke their trait and conjure a contact...maybe a sundry/supply shop (think True Grit) on the outskirts of the forest/swamp...through which you could gain a success in the challenge and some insight into where to go to look for this party.  1 (auto) success, narrative moves forward in an interesting way.  The Guide could invoke their Background trait daily to find food, shelter and avoid hazards daily and perhaps give all party members advantage on Constitution Saving Throws/Heal/Survival checks within the Condition Track to not move further along.You really just need a fully functional Condition Track system that interfaces well with the disparate resource schemes of 5e.  You also need much better advice on how to create narrative dynamism (Failing Forward, Success with Complications, Fortune in the Middle, Fiction First Task Resolution) and how to better the technique/chemistry of the users.  If it feels like its just "an exercise in dice rolling" then your group doesn't have chemistry for it (which it can develop) or your collective technique hasn't been groomed fully (which it can be) or you just don't care for the conflict resolution mechanical framework of Skill Challenges.  Loosing the Initiative Count mental framework is a good place to start.  Its a Narrative Conflict Resolution tool that is not sequenced by micromanaging one moment to the next.  Initiative is a poor-man's abstraction to simulate the task resolution of multiple parties "acting in real time" at the frequency of a combat.  No such thing needs to take place at the Skill Challenge level...especially over the course of a multi-hour/day Exploration Challenge.  Whatever comes to pass, it will require some sort of "multiple successes versus multiple failures format" otherwise player cost/benefit analysis will narrow the possible scope of approaches (and corresponding outcomes) to the most optimized for success and/or it will be anti-climactic as it will be over too quickly (with no chance for tension to be cultivated and thus victory exalted).  The best way to handle it is to have a mechanical incentive that is more than just "winning by way of the least resource expenditure or death avoidance" (the D&D combat credo).  Milestones/APs/Bennies, XP by way of narrative/roleplay effort or contribution...these sorts of things.</blockquote>

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