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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Mesh Hong" data-source="post: 5000367" data-attributes="member: 73463">I am wondering how to make this a worthwhile and exciting skill challenge, maybe we might want to split it up into areas. 1: climbing down the well2: first section of collapsing corridor3: second section of collapsing corridor – with additional hazard4: third section of collapsing corridor5: Cinematic leap to safety One issue I can see is that the environment could possibly be different for each PC as they might get to each section at different times. Maybe we could make this an individual skill challenge for each PC, but have them able to interact with each other. Area 1 is stable.Areas 2,3 and 4 have 3 states; intact, collapsing and collapsed.Area 5 is stable. Area 1 – Climbing down the well. Skill challenge:3 success before 3 failures Primary skills: Athletics, Acrobatics Athletics/Acrobatics – (average DC) – climb down well – on success make progress – on fail make no progress Secondary skills: Dungeoneering, Endurance Dungeoneering – (easy DC) - grant a +2 bonus to an allies next Athletics or Acrobatics checkEndurance – (easy DC) - can only use once and must have failed an Athletics or Acrobatics check - gain a +1 bonus to all Athletics and Acrobatics checks during this section. Success: you get to the bottom of the well safely.Fail: you fall down the well, lose a healing surge and take 3 -n (number of successes achieved in skill challenge) d10 damage. (eg had 1 success before 3 fails = 3-1 = 2d10 damage) Automatic on getting to bottom:-Perception (hard DC) or Dungeoneering (average DC) check to notice that the corridor ahead looks unstable.On success:Thievery (average DC) the floor and walls look like they will start to collapse as soon as any weight is applied to them. Area 2 – First section of collapsing corridor OK lets make the assumption that this section is 30 foot long, then lets subdivide it into 3x 10 foot sections. For the sake of the skill challenge each success will result in the PC moving 10 foot, so 3 successes are required to get through the section. Each Section has 3 states – intact, collapsing, and collapsed. When disturbed each section will degrade at the start of the next round. So in the first round each section is intact, until everyone has had their turn, then any section travelled over will start to collapse (making it more difficult for anyone following a round behind), then at the start of the next turn will collapse (meaning that anyone following will have to jump). Skill Challenge3 success’s required to pass Primary Skills: Athletics, Acrobatics AthleticsIntact – (easy DC) – move along corridorCollapsing – (average DC) – move along corridorCollapsed – Jump Check required to jump the entire collapsed distance (athletics divided check divided by 10 to jump number of squares, 2 squares for each collapsed subsection) AcrobaticsAllow same as Athletics, maybe even allow use of acrobatics in lieu of athletics for jumping? (an example of style over rules in skill challenge) Secondary Skills: Dungeoneering, endurance Dungeoneering – (easy DC) – grant a +4 bonus to an allies next athletic or acrobatics checkEndurance – (average DC) – gain a +2 bonus to all Athletics and Acrobatics check for this section. Success: move along sections until complete (3 success’s)Fail: either make no progress or if jumping and fail by less than 5 then no progress, or fail by 5 or more fall (you will need to determine just how far that is and the consequences) (note: potential flaw in entire premise of skill challenge here, but I will get back to that) Area 3 – Second section of collapsing corridor with additional hazard This is set up like Area 2 but the centre 10 foot section of the corridor is solid ground and contains an additional hazard to be negotiated quickly. Run the first and the third subsections as Area 2. The second subsection contains the Masher: a heavy stone section of ceiling pounds down on the platform in relentless rhythm (this activates when a PC successful clears Area 2). Primary Skill: Acrobatics, Thievery Acrobatics – (average DC) – you dive through avoiding the block – on fail by less than 5 you make it through but lose a healing surge and take 2d10+10 damage; on fail by more than 5 you make no progress and lose a healing surge and take 2d10+10 damage. Thievery – (hard / very hard DC) – you disable the Masher – on fail you do not disable the Masher and lose a healing surge Secondary Skill: Endurance – (hard DC) – you try and hold the masher to let your allies through – on success you take 2d10+10 damage and grant all allies a +5 bonus to their acrobatics check this turn for passing through the Masher – on fail you lose a healing surge and take 2d10+10 damage and grant all allies a +1 bonus to their acrobatics check this turn for passing through the Masher. Area 4 – Third section of collapsing corridor Run like area 2 Area 5 – Cinematic leap to safety One final athletics jump check to span maybe a 15 foot gap (athletics divided check divided by 10 to jump number of squares, in this case 3). For this final jump allow generous bonuses for the player describing truly cinematic exploits that finish off the sequence in a cool way.  Potential flaw in entire premise of skill challenge The premise of the skill challenge is that all the PCs will make a mad dash down the corridor, running, jumping, diving and looking like cool and action adventurers. The problem is what happens if they realise that they can just active the collapsing floor, then climb down, walk across the bottom of the pit and climb up the other side? In fact is not unforeseeable that at least one PC may be forced to do this if they are a couple of rounds back (still climbing down the well) when the collapsing floor is activated. Anyway that is my initial idea for approaching the skill challenge. It is far from perfect but it is a start. I am not overly happy with everything running off the same skills, but if they are the skills that your party is strong in then it shouldn’t really be a problem. The main thing is to understand each PC’s position along the entire challenge track, and the state of each section of floor, (this could be done on the battlemap). Something like:-(sorry the formatting doesn't like this bit but I hope it is still easy to understand) :::....... / _ _ _ ../ _ M _ ./ _ _ _ ./ _ area 1 / area 2 / area 3 / area 4 / area 5 Anyway I hope this helps or gives you an idea.</blockquote>

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