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Sample skill challenge
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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 4141183" data-attributes="member: 4937"><p>Ok, my turn to 'thread crap'.</p><p></p><p>To understand best what is going on here, don't start by thinking of it as a 'skill challenge'. </p><p></p><p>Let's start with something familiar: "How would you run this scenario [in a mature manner] in 3rd edition?" Then, armed with that knowledge, it ought to be pretty easy to convert to 4e.</p><p></p><p>I think the key is what Gorrstagg said here:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>In Gorrstagg's presentation, he begins by setting the in game stage. At no point is the DM saying, "Ok, let's have a skill challenge." The 'skill challenge' is the engine running underneath the game, and the players don't really have to know how it works. All they really need to know is, "We are in a suffering village. We are here to recover a gizmo, and the town elders don't like us."</p><p></p><p>If I were running this in 3rd edition, I might run the scenario like this. Initially, set a target DC on convincing the town elders to cooperate to something like DC 35 (diplomacy, bluff, or intimidate). That way, its possible that a very charismatic individual can walk into town and impress/terrify/scam the elders immediately, and have the quest end thier if they like, but its not particularly likely (and the elders would still beg the PC's for help, possibly leading back to the subquests depending on the character goals of the party). </p><p></p><p>Realistically though, the PC's would have to do things to change the elders relationship to the PC's. That could include initial attempts to use diplomacy to influence the town elders attitude (which might lower the DC by itself by a good amount), and it could include things like proving thier friendship by doing things which further the town elders goals. For this scenario, those goals might all be fundamentally the same - ensure the town survival. But in a typical scenario I'd run, each elder would be an individual with individual goals that depended on the NPC's alignment, motivations, and personality. For example, one elder would be grieving for a striken child and the main way to sway that elder would be heal the child (and possibly take the child away with them and see that he/she is cared for!). Another elder might be most open to bribery, and so forth. </p><p></p><p>By completing various subquests (including ones I might not have thought of), the required DC to win the gizmo using diplomacy would be reduced by various amounts. Conversely, if the PC's really flub something, then I'd raise the DC accordingly.</p><p></p><p>The thing I like about this is that it doesn't constrain the PC's. If a PC heals an NPC with 'Heal' or with 'Cure Disease', its the same thing. And I'm not railroading the party. If the party decides to overcome the challenge by killing every combatant in the villege, or by stealthily stealing the gizmo, that's thier decision. </p><p></p><p>(This is actually a pretty old method for resolving these kind of situations. The 1st edition DragonLance modules are actually filled with little subsystems for resolving these very sorts of things.)</p><p></p><p>I'm not at all convinced that 'skill challenges' give you anything new except a formalized system for handling all such challenges within a consistant framework. Having these new rules, I wouldn't change how I'd actually run the scenario at all. I'd simply have a different (well, slightly different) backend behind the scenes for keeping track of how well the PC's were doing so that I would know when the PC's could go to the elders and get the goods or perhaps even when the elders would go to the PC's and say that they've changed thier minds. </p><p></p><p>But I wouldn't ever say, "This is a skill challenge. What skill do you want to use to contribute to your success?"</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 4141183, member: 4937"] Ok, my turn to 'thread crap'. To understand best what is going on here, don't start by thinking of it as a 'skill challenge'. Let's start with something familiar: "How would you run this scenario [in a mature manner] in 3rd edition?" Then, armed with that knowledge, it ought to be pretty easy to convert to 4e. I think the key is what Gorrstagg said here: In Gorrstagg's presentation, he begins by setting the in game stage. At no point is the DM saying, "Ok, let's have a skill challenge." The 'skill challenge' is the engine running underneath the game, and the players don't really have to know how it works. All they really need to know is, "We are in a suffering village. We are here to recover a gizmo, and the town elders don't like us." If I were running this in 3rd edition, I might run the scenario like this. Initially, set a target DC on convincing the town elders to cooperate to something like DC 35 (diplomacy, bluff, or intimidate). That way, its possible that a very charismatic individual can walk into town and impress/terrify/scam the elders immediately, and have the quest end thier if they like, but its not particularly likely (and the elders would still beg the PC's for help, possibly leading back to the subquests depending on the character goals of the party). Realistically though, the PC's would have to do things to change the elders relationship to the PC's. That could include initial attempts to use diplomacy to influence the town elders attitude (which might lower the DC by itself by a good amount), and it could include things like proving thier friendship by doing things which further the town elders goals. For this scenario, those goals might all be fundamentally the same - ensure the town survival. But in a typical scenario I'd run, each elder would be an individual with individual goals that depended on the NPC's alignment, motivations, and personality. For example, one elder would be grieving for a striken child and the main way to sway that elder would be heal the child (and possibly take the child away with them and see that he/she is cared for!). Another elder might be most open to bribery, and so forth. By completing various subquests (including ones I might not have thought of), the required DC to win the gizmo using diplomacy would be reduced by various amounts. Conversely, if the PC's really flub something, then I'd raise the DC accordingly. The thing I like about this is that it doesn't constrain the PC's. If a PC heals an NPC with 'Heal' or with 'Cure Disease', its the same thing. And I'm not railroading the party. If the party decides to overcome the challenge by killing every combatant in the villege, or by stealthily stealing the gizmo, that's thier decision. (This is actually a pretty old method for resolving these kind of situations. The 1st edition DragonLance modules are actually filled with little subsystems for resolving these very sorts of things.) I'm not at all convinced that 'skill challenges' give you anything new except a formalized system for handling all such challenges within a consistant framework. Having these new rules, I wouldn't change how I'd actually run the scenario at all. I'd simply have a different (well, slightly different) backend behind the scenes for keeping track of how well the PC's were doing so that I would know when the PC's could go to the elders and get the goods or perhaps even when the elders would go to the PC's and say that they've changed thier minds. But I wouldn't ever say, "This is a skill challenge. What skill do you want to use to contribute to your success?" [/QUOTE]
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