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Message: <blockquote data-quote="ender_wiggin" data-source="post: 5064335" data-attributes="member: 21629">I'm of the opinion that designing skill challenges is an art form that can be mastered through seeing it done well, and that there is no uniform form or formula that can be applied to every situation where a skill challenge could be used. That's someone else's words.My interpretation: the skill challenge is like a machine with an input and an output. The input is skill checks, the output is a myriad of possible results that the various permutations of successes and failures create. The machine works with a specific set of rules, and is theoretically deterministic, meaning that if you have the same input situation and you input the same skill checks, the same thing will come out every time (it's theoretical because this never happens). Furthermore, the machine is opaque to the players, but by using it repeatedly, they can develop insight into its internal workings and if it is around for long enough, they can be strategic about what kind of skills they use and when. Some machines are quick and simple contraptions thrown together ad hoc. Others are intricately designed devices that feature an elaborate set of moving parts. Every machine is different, and it takes experience and innovation to design skill challenges that are a blast to use.If people have skill challenges that they have run that worked out well, I'd like to see what kind of inventive things people have done. If you have links to challenges other people have made (on or off this forum), that would be awesome as well.I've read the magazines and have seen the cool things that the designers have put out (imho, Mearls's feature skill challenges are much better than the examples they use in the book -- the X successes before Y failures model is just one class of machine that is applicable to some situations but certainly not all). I've also read alternate skill challenge systems (like Stalker0's, which he put a lot of really good work into), and although I think they are interesting, I don't believe there is one model that is universally applicable.What I'm really looking for is a collection of SPECIFIC challenges that work well, as I think that is the best way to learn how to do this effectively and on the fly.</blockquote>

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