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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Barastrondo" data-source="post: 5047339" data-attributes="member: 3820">I kind of felt the same way about spells being used to overcome social challenges, to be honest; they were pretty dull. The silver-tongued rogue is always the second best option because the wizard has a social gun that kills with one shot (though save negates). I prefer systems where the silver-tongued rogue is the first choice to go to for bluffing your way past the guards, or the cleric can trust an inspirational speech to have as great a chance as anything.I dunno, maybe we just don't play like the generic "you" who hacks their way in and hacks their way out of just about everything, but I didn't see a reduction in non-combat negotiations because the quick fix of the spell was taken away. Skill checks are still skill checks, as before, skill challenges are what you want to use if a situation has taken on the comparable gravity of a combat encounter (without being about combat). The main thing is that skill challenges are designed to engage everyone at the table, like a combat: everyone gets a turn. This is a very good idea, but it also suffers terribly if you give poor examples, like social challenges where Intimidate is an auto-fail: you're pretty much punishing the fighter (or other classes who only have Intimidate as a social class skill) for taking part, which goes against the idea that engaging all players is a good thing. Is it really only "some" DMs who use skill challenges, though? Man, that seems horrid. It's like playing 3.5 and only "some" DMs using the craft items rules.</blockquote>

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