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Failure stakes for a travel Skill Challenge
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<blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 7565568" data-attributes="member: 82106"><p>Any game with story and drama has stakes. 4e is lacking in explicit mechanics which put those stakes on the table in a system way, but if there is conflict there are stakes. Moreover 4e DOES have nascent ways of working with them. In an SC it is pretty easy to interpret the system of Advantages and the DMs hard checks as a way to do that for example. The use of consumables as a somewhat expensive resource (rituals too) can also have a stakes effect. Likewise Page 42 has that tenor. None of these HAVE to be interpreted that way, nor used exclusively that way, but its not too hard to do it. Admittedly I developed my own game to make it easier and more straightforward, but 4e is better than a lot of games for this.</p><p></p><p></p><p>On the map it is a road, but in fact, after 100 years of infrequent travel, it could be a faint path. Washed away in some places, crossed by other paths, etc. You could also play up the dark between the lights. While 4e takes a fairly conventional D&D-genre approach to that, I always thought it was more interesting to make the darkness <strong>dark</strong>. The world is strange, and not the friend of man in this new age. Nothing you see or meet is quite to be trusted, there's always more to any situation than meets the eye. </p><p></p><p>The party comes upon a cabin on the 2nd day out. Its a bit nippy, and dark is falling, a fire burns inside, the door is open and the place looks clean and welcoming! Look there's even some stew cooking in the kettle, and warm bread on the hearth. Strange that the folk of the house are absent, but maybe they just went to feed the animals. Who knows if our brave adventurers will even make it back to the road? I don't...</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>I would say that in my model of play the length of a journey isn't really determinant. If nothing is really at stake, the a trip of 1000 miles is color, but crossing the street could be a great adventure. I mean, I'd want to make a long trip 'feel' like one to the characters, but the player only needs a vicarious sense of that, much like a trip in a novel where the relevance is getting to the destination. Likewise we depict the trip across the street as short, that is a relevant aspect of the fictional position, but it may be quite eventful and take a long time to play out!</p><p></p><p>I would say, I don't normally use [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION]'s type of procedure because I want the challenges to represent material changes in the fictional position of the PCs. Its quite possible in his system for the end result to 'the same just one day closer' and since length of journey isn't a very important plot element for its own sake, that isn't really a material change.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="AbdulAlhazred, post: 7565568, member: 82106"] Any game with story and drama has stakes. 4e is lacking in explicit mechanics which put those stakes on the table in a system way, but if there is conflict there are stakes. Moreover 4e DOES have nascent ways of working with them. In an SC it is pretty easy to interpret the system of Advantages and the DMs hard checks as a way to do that for example. The use of consumables as a somewhat expensive resource (rituals too) can also have a stakes effect. Likewise Page 42 has that tenor. None of these HAVE to be interpreted that way, nor used exclusively that way, but its not too hard to do it. Admittedly I developed my own game to make it easier and more straightforward, but 4e is better than a lot of games for this. On the map it is a road, but in fact, after 100 years of infrequent travel, it could be a faint path. Washed away in some places, crossed by other paths, etc. You could also play up the dark between the lights. While 4e takes a fairly conventional D&D-genre approach to that, I always thought it was more interesting to make the darkness [b]dark[/b]. The world is strange, and not the friend of man in this new age. Nothing you see or meet is quite to be trusted, there's always more to any situation than meets the eye. The party comes upon a cabin on the 2nd day out. Its a bit nippy, and dark is falling, a fire burns inside, the door is open and the place looks clean and welcoming! Look there's even some stew cooking in the kettle, and warm bread on the hearth. Strange that the folk of the house are absent, but maybe they just went to feed the animals. Who knows if our brave adventurers will even make it back to the road? I don't... I would say that in my model of play the length of a journey isn't really determinant. If nothing is really at stake, the a trip of 1000 miles is color, but crossing the street could be a great adventure. I mean, I'd want to make a long trip 'feel' like one to the characters, but the player only needs a vicarious sense of that, much like a trip in a novel where the relevance is getting to the destination. Likewise we depict the trip across the street as short, that is a relevant aspect of the fictional position, but it may be quite eventful and take a long time to play out! I would say, I don't normally use [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION]'s type of procedure because I want the challenges to represent material changes in the fictional position of the PCs. Its quite possible in his system for the end result to 'the same just one day closer' and since length of journey isn't a very important plot element for its own sake, that isn't really a material change. [/QUOTE]
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