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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 8367383" data-attributes="member: 82106">And I take it as the 4e approach is entirely successful, by default. 'Bob' climbs the scree with difficulty at level 1 and the slope in Tartarus at level 30. Yeah, so what if the numbers are the same on the DC, it is the fiction I care about, and how the game engine DRIVES the resulting outcomes. Its a d20 system, so there isn't really all that much choice in terms of numbers on the dice being the same. I mean, if you want to do dice pools, then you can make bigger pools match against bigger DCs instead of using a level bonus type of concept. 5e just misses the boat here, yes, you can simply set the DC of Tartarus the same as the DC of level 1's scree. Fair enough, but you have radically changed the relationship of the challenge for every other PC except Bob! (IE the ones that are proficient). And 4e's RC DC chart indicates that even a Hard level 30 check is only BARELY impossible for 4e Bob. I mean, granted, even if he finds another +5 he is unlikely to pass the check, but then again 5e Bob won't either if the GM actually increases the DC, which I think he is obliged to do if he wants to demonstrate more dangerous circumstances. Sure, 4e without using an SC has a valence issue similar to 5e, but the fact is 4e DOES have SCs, and they are normally pretty easy to implement for situations of a "We take on this environmental/terrain challenge" I would be surprised to find very many GMs who are unable to make that work. I don't think it is fair to judge 4e on the basis of no SCs any more than it is fair to judge 5e on the basis of ignorance about how skills should(n't) be used, if it comes down to it.So, if we look at both systems PROPERLY PLAYED, then 4e provides both terrains as SCs or SC elements, and provides a DC which will mechanically work with the characters of the PC's level, trusting that the GM will 'skin' things in an milieu/genre appropriate way (IE Tartarus vs some hill near town). Each of these SCs will, presumably, yield equivalent chances of success.5e will provide that you can ask for a skill check. The GM will then have to ask himself if he wants to depict the climb in Tartarus as any different from the one near town. Maybe yes, maybe no, its up to him... Presumably he folds in some sort of sense of 'genre appropriateness' and maybe he decides the slope in Tartarus is 'equivalently hard', and then most of the party will just climb up with basically no chance of failure. Nobody even knows what happens if Bob fails, does he take some damage? Does he get stuck and then someone needs to rescue him (IE expend some other resource) or what? In 4e if he fails, it checks a fail box on the SC, maybe another PC can undo that failure (this is an option in some SCs), or help Bob in the first place (Aid Another), or maybe the players can describe an approach in which Bob never has to make a check, or his check is only a test to see if he slips and gets dinged an HS on the way up. There are choices, but all this will be spelled out ahead of time. Frankly, in 4e I would only use standalone Skill Checks for situations where the player really initiates a test of their skill, or where another subsystem already establishes the value of the outcomes (IE a monster knowledge check or similar). In other situations the outcome is fundamentally just advisory and for color. I don't even bother with those. Something happens, it isn't really important what it is, or it spurs some new scene framing down the road, perhaps.</blockquote>

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