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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Wulf Ratbane" data-source="post: 4285560" data-attributes="member: 94">Everyone still questioning which bonuses apply where can save themselves a lot of trouble by going back and reading this overlooked but important post.<a href="http://www.enworld.org/showpost.php?p=4279427&postcount=32" target="_blank">http://www.enworld.org/showpost.php?p=4279427&postcount=32</a>Down the left hand column is the skill check success rate. The actual skill bonuses don't matter, the DC doesn't matter, the success rate is all that matters. We don't care how the PC accumulates that success rate (whether by attributes, feats, powers, etc.). It doesn't matter.Pay special attention to the .60 and .70 lines.A .60 success rate means the PC is looking for a natural 9 or better. (It's a +11 bonus against a DC 20, for example; it can also represent a +6 bonus against DC15.)A .70 success rate means the PC is looking for a natural 7 or better. (It's a +13 bonus against a DC20.)A simple +2 bonus differentiates these two cases.The .60 group succeeds (at best) 36% of the time and their success rate drops off dramatically as complexity (the number of successes required) increases.The .70 group approaches 50% success at the simplest complexity and their success rate actually increases as complexity increases.The .65 line represents the tipping point: Pretty much a flat 42%-43% success rate across the board.If you can keep your game in that .65 range, success and failure will be predictable. But deviate to one side or the other of that tipping point and the results, and the effect it will have on your game, are not at all intuitive.I can certainly accept/anticipate that WotC intended for skill checks to reliably fall into that .65 range, but the fact that the system becomes so swingy is well outside the expected performance of 4th edition. It is like a very precariously balanced spinning top, and the slightest push sends it wobbling out of control.That kind of design is not very 4e-like when you compare it to the stability and robustness of the rest of the system.</blockquote>

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