NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6205917" data-attributes="member: 42582">[MENTION=14391]Warbringer[/MENTION] has done the maths, saving me the trouble (thanks Warbringer, sorry no XP).And yes, 4e skill challenge mechanics are based around a good average chance of success per check to ensure a robust overall chance of success. It's very similar to D&D combat. One way of analysing D&D combat is in these terms: that hit points, by letting you suffer hits without losing, grant you rerolls vs your enemies, so that you eventually have a good prospect of taking them down. But those hit points are a resource, and replenishing them costs more resources (spells, surges, time, whatever). And that is part of the dynamic of play. In  [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION]'s example the players spend resources (powers, APs) in order to achieve success (in some cases, literally via rerolls). Much like combat.But what you are calling "ad libbing into the story" is what I call roleplaying. The player says what his/her PC does. That is then resolved, and the fiction changes appropriately - in ways which themselves frame future possibilities of action. When the player of a wizard says "I cast Wall of Iron across the passage, trapping the giants on the other side" do you count that as "ad libbing into the story"? I'm not sure that I see any major difference.This also goes to the point that decisions that matter are made in play, not outside of it. The player, in order to make a check, has to declare an action - that is, put his/her PC into some new fictional position (such as dressing down the chamberlain). This itself is significant. It is contributing to the fiction, and setting new starting points for the action declarations from the other players as well as oneself.</blockquote>

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