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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 8220166" data-attributes="member: 82106">My feeling is that what they do is A) focus activity in a specific direction, so the players have a solid idea of what they are attempting to accomplish RIGHT NOW and they stay on track; B) it prevents the GM from simply moving the goal posts on what they are trying to accomplish. This can be either in favor of or against the PCs, like "Oh, well, how about best 3 out of 5..." or OTOH "OK, you tracked him, now you have to find his hiding place. Oh, you did that, well, now you have to bribe the guard..." Because the player knows what a given success will bring, and how likely they are to achieve their goal, they can better decide if they want to spend resources on it.This is where, IMHO, the 4e SC system mechanically isn't super well served and tightly specified, is in terms of what resource expenditures will bring. They can have obvious narrative effects, but mechanically they only matter if they are directly changing a bonus to a skill check. Most resources (AP, HS, powers) don't really do that. So the game could have used a bit more firm specification on this point.Overall I just make SCs all of play where any conflict is ongoing, except combat itself. There is 'free play', but it isn't used to decide any issues, merely as a way to describe things where the outcome can simply be stated, or which are just 'background' stuff.</blockquote>