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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5510750" data-attributes="member: 42582">I think that the key is in your last two sentences. For a skill challenge to be interesting, the resolution of any given check (whether as a success or a failure) needs to have a bearing on the next die roll, either (i) by determining what sort of skill check is viable, or (ii) by determining what success or failure on that check would mean, or (iii) both.There are some skill challenges where this is probably not the case - eg simple Arcana or Thievery checks to disarm traps and the like. That's part of why I tend to find these fairly boring, and to limit them to complexity 1 checks. Even then, I like to narrate the result in terms of what happens to the situation in terms perhaps of equipment lost or damaged, or magical forces unleashed, so as to change the circumstances for decision-making or the stakes of continuing as the challenge unfolds.But in a more interesting challenge - and most of mine are either social challenges, or "travel" challenges (be that overland travel, escaping from collapsing ruins, sneaking into an enemy base, etc) - then there is a lot greater scope to bring out changing circumstances and stakes as part of the resolution of one skill check and the opening up of the next one.A very simple example of what I have in mind comes from a recent session: the PCs encountered an irate dire bear in a ruined temple that they were exploring, and decided to try to pacify it rather than fight it. Two of the PCs reached out to it emotionally (the ranger using Nature up close, the wizard using Nature while patting it with Mage Hand) while two others cowed it (the paladin up close, the sorcerer by wreathing himself in lightning by expending his Spark Form power - both made Initimidate checks). The fighter, on the other hand, neither Intimidated it nor connected with it, and it therefore continue to want to eat him.The upshot of these choices about skill use, then, aren't just that the bear is pacified. They also mean that the ranger and wizard have befriended it - and can subsequently interact with it in various ways - whereas the paladin and sorcerer, of whom it is scared, have to keep away if those interactions are to succeed. And the fighter, if left alone with the bear, is still in danger of being attacked by it.For some discussion of that challenge, plus another one from the same session (involving a fight with a water weird), see <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/301282-actual-play-examples-balance-between-fiction-mechanics.html" target="_blank">this thread</a>.</blockquote>

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