I was thinking of the posts in this thread that assume there will be things like "elven cloaks" that shift the difficulty of a stealth task by one level, or "Cat's Grace" spells that shift the difficulty of a balance task by one level. In other words, system artifacts (not Artifacts
) that modify difficulty, in addition to the "player ingenuity" modifications. In effect, this amounts to a (+15) die modifier, but it's stated as "shifting the difficulty level" in the coversation.
Please note that when I brought up elven cloaks shifting the level of the task, that was in the context of an example of how modular rules could be applied to the system--or not--and it was part of an example with lots of fiddly bits where the cloak was limited by situation.
But having thought about it overnight, I'd think that you could go either way--"great elven cloaks" or "cloaks of invisibility" or such that shift the rating, versus the basic elven cloaks that give you a +2 to your roll, at whatever rating you currently knew.
And I think from some of the replies, that I'm reading this differently than others. I see this as a lot like D&D spell levels in some ways. That is, the "difficulty ratings" are tiers, like spells levels. Until you can cast third level arcane spells, you can't cast
fireball. Until you can do master level stealth, you can't do (list of tasks limited to master or greater). Those difficulty ratings can be highly dependent on level or not. That is part of the point. If the only way to get third level arcane spells is to be a 5th level or greater wizard (in a simple version), then that would be similar to being a 9th level thief to get master level stealth. But you might have a bard that gets both things later. And you might have a more complex modular option that lets characters use skill ranks or feats or whatever to get the abilities.
Besides all that, you also have things that let you tweak your chances slightly within the tier you already have. If you are a 5th level 3E Wizard with spell penetration, then you've got a bit better chance of making your
fireball count. If you are a 5E rogue with the some sneaky feat, you have a better shot at making that DC 15 for the things appropriate to your current tier.
So no, I don't see these labels as simply semantics for increasing DCs.
Even if you manage to power optimize your rogue to have +15 to your sneak chances, you don't move up a tier by virtue of that bonus alone. This is the key reason to have the system, as indicated by the early discussion in the article about people cracking the expected DCs by such power gaming. And if well designed, no one would go after such a bonus. They would be better served geting some bonuses and then spending the rest of their efforts improving tiers in that skill or others.
I do think that having one rank where you roll at DC 15 (with situational and other adjustments), with one rank easier being automatic and one rank harder being fail, is not so hot--except in the simplest versions that could be done using those rules--i.e. something analogous to Basic D&D using attributes for skills. As a rough and ready way to guide DM fiat, while still allowing some key rolls, that works well enough. But for the more complex options, I would think you would want a more gradual curve. Something like: 2 easier, auto success. 1 easier, set DC at "easy". Current rating, set DC at "medium". 1 harder, set DC at "hard". 2 harder, auto fail. Since the easy/medium/hard part are flat DCs, you don't need the 4E skill chart to scale by level, and remembering 10/15/20 or whatever they are is no big deal.
