Skill challenge question - how would you...

[Piratecat]

...design a skill challenge where first level heroes encounter a demon prince in the dungeon and live to tell the tale?

From Mike Mearls' blog, ages ago (thanks, Rechan):

Skill Challenges as Tool for Putting Demogorgon on Dungeon Level 1

Here's a stray thought about skill challenges. Back in the 1e days, you'd hear all sorts of stories about dungeons where Orcus and Tiamat stomped around on level 1. Meeting those monsters is, obviously, instant death.

In 4e, you could do the same thing, but if you want to give the PCs a chance to live, use the encounter as a skill challenge. You could even make it a level 1 (or whatever is appropriate) challenge to give the PCs a chance and work the big bad guy into the story.

For instance, the PCs open a door to a summoning chamber in the abandoned wizard's lab, and out bursts Demogorgon. Before he returns to the Abyss, his two heads demand that the PCs do him a favor. Cue the skill challenge (success, you're in Demogorgon's debt; failure, he eats a few PCs).

There's no reason why the superstars of D&D's monster world can't show up early in a campaign, and the skill challenge system is a good way to use them in situations other than combat.​

Okay, I love this idea. How might you carry it off?

 

[Rechan]

Welcome.

There's one thing that really bugs me about that article though.

The notion of skill challenges is that failure = setback.

In Mearls' post, he suggests:
Success = Setback
Failure = INSTANT DEATH

 

[ExploderWizard]

...design a skill challenge where first level heroes encounter a demon prince in the dungeon and live to tell the tale?

From Mike Mearls' blog, ages ago (thanks, Rechan):

Skill Challenges as Tool for Putting Demogorgon on Dungeon Level 1

Here's a stray thought about skill challenges. Back in the 1e days, you'd hear all sorts of stories about dungeons where Orcus and Tiamat stomped around on level 1. Meeting those monsters is, obviously, instant death.

In 4e, you could do the same thing, but if you want to give the PCs a chance to live, use the encounter as a skill challenge. You could even make it a level 1 (or whatever is appropriate) challenge to give the PCs a chance and work the big bad guy into the story.

For instance, the PCs open a door to a summoning chamber in the abandoned wizard's lab, and out bursts Demogorgon. Before he returns to the Abyss, his two heads demand that the PCs do him a favor. Cue the skill challenge (success, you're in Demogorgon's debt; failure, he eats a few PCs).

There's no reason why the superstars of D&D's monster world can't show up early in a campaign, and the skill challenge system is a good way to use them in situations other than combat.
​

Okay, I love this idea. How might you carry it off?

Super idea. The first thing required is a semi-plausible reason why the big bad entity doesn't just swat the PC's like flies. Perhaps the PC's stumble upon the scene and find a dead high priest in the area. The big bad now needs the PC's to deliver the message that the priest was supposed to carry (before he showed a fatal lack of respect).

The first part of the challenge could center on the PC's convincing the big bad that they could be useful. Diplomacy, Bluff, and knowledge skills will be required in this part.

If the big bad decides that the mortals are worthy of serving him perhaps a test of thier toughness is in order. Have the bad guy summon up some approriate level servitors to attack the PC's. This combat can be part of the larger challenge.

After proving thier toughness maybe the bad guy wants to test thier wits. A puzzle that tests intelligence is set before the party and they must solve it.

Once the mental and physical challenges have been completed, the PC's are given the message that must be delivered. To enforce a sense of urgency, the big evil starts to collapse the place everyone is standing in. The challenge is to make it out with the message alive. The PC's have X amount of time to deliver the message or more powerful servitors will be sent to clean up the mess.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Welcome.

There's one thing that really bugs me about that article though.

The notion of skill challenges is that failure = setback.

In Mearls' post, he suggests:
Success = Setback
Failure = INSTANT DEATH

I'd file this under "exception based design".

Okay, I would not. I might consider more:
"Am I an unfair rat bastard DM for springing this on my players?" If they would walk into this unaware of this risk (because I didn't give them any clues), such an outcome for the challenge would be obviously unfair.
In that case, I might have something like:
Success: The PCs have to do something, but will get rewarded.
Failure: The PCs have to do something, plus provide some souls to feed the Demon with, and if they can't provide that, it's their souls instead.

A Skill Challenge "against" Orcus or Demogorgon might mostly involve convincing him you are worth more alive than dead.
Primary Skills: Bluff, Diplomacy, Intimidate
Secondary Skills: Arcana, History, Insight, Religion
General Note: All primary skills can be used to gain no more than 1/2 of the successes required to beat the challenge. Secondary skills do not cause failures.
Bluff: You lie about what you might do for the Demon. Success doesn't necessarily mean he believes any of your lies, but at least he appreciates your boldness.
Diplomacy: Sweet-Talking is certainly the best way. You might convince him to not take your soul, if you can perform a task for him.
Intimidate: Of course you can't intimidate Orcus or Demogorgon, but you show off your resolve to overcome even tough situations.
Arcana, History, Religion: These checks indicate you have some useful knowledge. You can gain a +2 bonus to your next check with them. Gain up to one success by using one of the skills.
Insight: Helps you read what might catch the Demon Princes interest. Gain up to one success, and a +2 bonus to your next check.
Other skills: Any skill that might show off some notable or useful competence can be used to award a +2 to your next check, but a failure results in a -2 penalty to your next check.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Welcome.

There's one thing that really bugs me about that article though.

The notion of skill challenges is that failure = setback.

In Mearls' post, he suggests:
Success = Setback
Failure = INSTANT DEATH

I don't see anything wrong with life or death stakes in a skill challenge. How is that different than combat? The mathematical odds of success vs failure should be equal to a level appropriate combat though.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Super idea. The first thing required is a semi-plausible reason why the big bad entity doesn't just swat the PC's like flies. Perhaps the PC's stumble upon the scene and find a dead high priest in the area. The big bad now needs the PC's to deliver the message that the priest was supposed to carry (before he showed a fatal lack of respect).

The first part of the challenge could center on the PC's convincing the big bad that they could be useful. Diplomacy, Bluff, and knowledge skills will be required in this part.

If the big bad decides that the mortals are worthy of serving him perhaps a test of thier toughness is in order. Have the bad guy summon up some approriate level servitors to attack the PC's. This combat can be part of the larger challenge.

After proving thier toughness maybe the bad guy wants to test thier wits. A puzzle that tests intelligence is set before the party and they must solve it.

Once the mental and physical challenges have been completed, the PC's are given the message that must be delivered. To enforce a sense of urgency, the big evil starts to collapse the place everyone is standing in. The challenge is to make it out with the message alive. The PC's have X amount of time to deliver the message or more powerful servitors will be sent to clean up the mess.

I like this idea, too. But I would make sure it all happens _fast_. These are demons, no nonsense type of guys that love to bash things and destroy the world. Sure they can make long plans and all that, but these are low level guys with little power. (Backgroundwise, the Demon could have predicted that this would happen and had already everything set in motion for the deal, so he doesn't need long to make any decisions.)

I suppose it should be more than one skill challenge:
Step 1) Convince the Demon that you are more useful alive.
Step 2) Make a Deal. (The goal is to reduce what it costs the party, some costs probably being "metaphysical", like how many souls to give to Orucs).
Step 3) Escape the collapsing Dungeon/Temple. (If the party would fail at escaping the deal is off )

Some characters might not want to strike deal with the demonl, though. They could have an "opt-out" option.

If the PC succeeds the "deal challenge", the Patron God of the character or a similar NPC will raise the dead PC "for free", on the condition of sabotaging the demons plans (not necessarily break the deal, but use everything he knows about the party and learns over time when they try to fulfill the deal to work against the demons plans.)
If they fail, he must be raised normally. I would award a PC that has chosen to sacrifice himself rather than deal with the Devil to gain the same XP reward as the rest of the party.

 

[Jack99]

How about:

Convincing Demogorgon That You Are Not Worth Eating Because You Can Be Used For Something Insignificant That Would Otherwise Be A Waste Of His Or His Minions' Time - Level 1 skill challenge, complexity special

In reality, we are dealing with 2 skill challenges here:
1st part: Survive the initial "encounter" with ol' two-heads and convince him that you shouldn't be eaten / ripped to pieces.
2nd part: Convince him you can be used for something, or he might still eat/kill/rip you apart.

Surviving (Complexity 1; 4 successes before 3 failures)
Key skills:
Diplomacy: DC 18
You beg for your life the best you have learnt!

Bluff: DC 18
Drawing on your knowledge of Demogorgon, you fake it as his followers.

Other skills:
Arcana: DC 18
You find in your brain a sizable amount of information about Demogorgon and his cults. A succesful arcana check gives a +2 bonus to the next diplomacy check and/or opens up for the use of Bluff.
Intimidate (special): Any attempt to use intimidate results in a swift death.

2nd Part: Convincing him that you are useful (Complexity 5; 12 successes before 3 failures)
Key skills (no more than 2 successes per skill per character)
Arcana/Religion/Nature DC16: show of knowledge/control of magic, showing you are up to the task.
Acrobatics/Athletics 18: jump/feats of strength, impressing (lol) him.
Diplomacy or bluff, DC21 (special): smoothing things out, in case someone screws up. Immediately after an unsuccesful check from one of your allies, you may attempt to reverse what happened (changing the failure to a success)

Other skills:
Endurance or Bluff DC 16, special: All participants of the skill challenge must within the first 5 checks make an endurance check to see how well they keep their cool. Each failure gives a cumultative -1 penalty to the rest of the SC's checks. Each success gives a +1 cumultative bonus to the rest of the SC's checks.
Intimidate, special: Any attempt to use intimidate results in a swift death.
Insight, DC 18: You read Demogorgon and realize you are on the right track. +2 to your next check.

Edit: the DC's are higher than "high" in the WotC errataed SC's. This is on purpose due to the many issues we know there is with the original and the errataed numbers.

 

[Piratecat]

I like where this is going. Hey - if you're one of my players, scram! Shoo! Shoo!

-- o --

For me, the demon is going to be a fiendish Lord of Pride named Cenox, one of the devils who bargained with Bael Turath to give them the power that warped them into tieflings. He's interested in the success of the tiefling race but is grievously out of touch with the world. Those tieflings are doing well, right? They conquered the world? No? Tsk.

As such, I think my two challenges are going to be "give him a reason not to turn the dragonborn paladin PC's bones into molten metal" and then "prove that you're useful enough to him that he won't chain you to a burning iron grate."

I'll want to dwell on pride - in appearance, accomplishments and power, I think. He'll be very interested in history, and has a task that the PCs can do in exchange for living. Heck, he'll even reward them for it, or grant them infernal power. This thread is giving me some good ideas on how to accomplish that.

 

[jbear]

Maybe failure, instead of resulting in death, results in something more like a geas, where the PC's are 'obliged' to do some dirty work for the Demon, something evil, or face the terrible consequences. Maybe they are sent to annoy/scout out some demonic rival of the demon lord, creator of a rival race (Half-Orcs vs Tieflings? Some Demonic competition?)

Success, results in freedom and even some dark blessing, that could get the PC's into trouble later on.

My PC's have unwittingly been i the service of Zehir, evil god of poison. They were destroying the altars of Zehir's rebellious son Auxl. Serving evil to destroy another evil that threatens its position of power. All at the promise of a 'dubious' blessing that would win favour amongst many they would normally consider enemies but also create many enemies both good and bad, including some they would normally consider allies. Unfortunately they put thier foot in it and only managed to infuriate Auxl who is now hell bent on bringing the temple down on their heads... so I don't know what is going to happen...

My PC's are level 3, about to hit lvl 4. I ripped off the final encounter of the revised KotS and made the Thing in the Portal the semi-summoned manifestation of Auxl. The PC's had only achieved 2/8 successes made trying to reverse the ritual with no fails when Kalarel fell and was dragged off into the portal( I reskinned him as a snake-man highpriest named Sshliss, changing necrotic dmg for poison dmg). As the PC's headed towards the altar to read the ritual book to close Auxl down, Auxl reacted by disappearing from the portal, a gust of wind blowing out all the torches.

When the PC's lit things up again Auxl had moved to the altar, surrounding it with his dark essence protectively. (I decided a mini-challenge was neccesary to dislodge him back to the portal , 3 successes before 3 failures) The PC's didn't bite, they just backed off.

The blood in the pool, meanwhile began to evaporate,in a swirling waterspout of red vapour which formed a disembodied hand that began to scrape a message in the dried blood of the elaborate floor beneath (doorway to the inner temple). After deciphering the snake language the message was written in a second silmultaneous skill challenge began.

The message invited them to destroy Auxl's altars and statues throughout the temple to receive a blessing (written by the hand of Zehir himself). As they got closer to their goal Auxl stopped protecting the altar and spread hs presence throughout the three levels of the temple at each main altar and statue. 1d3 shadow snakes appearing per round (minions) to whittle away at the PC's with psychic attacks.

So now it was a battle on three seperate levels of the temple with 2 simultaneous skill challenges running all at the same time. Unfortunately, despite initial success, the PC's accidently destroyed the temple's light filter mirror system and one of the huge mirrors they were using to strike the altars with direct sunlight to destroy them. 3rd and 4th failures (athough 3 failures was enough...) were both critical failures. And with the shattered mirrors all over the floors and the temple beginning to tremble and crumble down above their heads, they will either have to flee for their lives or risk being buried beneath thousands of kilos of stone and destroy the last two remaing statues...

So here I find myself facing a similar situation to the Skill Challenge Fail and Die. If they insist on trying to defeat Auxl... and then they fail...? I can't think of anything happening other than them dying. I hope they are feeling creative next session and can come up with some clever solutions. Should I make a possible escape route hidden in the inner part of the temple below the door where Zehir wrote his message? They have already been in there and explored the area beneath, so they know it was a dead end? Or just let failure mean death?

It is funny though. Despite the protests of my players when I communicated the dire consequences of their failure, noone could stop talking about last nights game today. In a way I think they enjoy the very real chance of instant death.

Don't get me wrong. I hope they survive. But I get the feeling they appreciate the very real chance of dying. Maybe because it adds a real sense of danger to the game, and thus meaning is given to all their acts and decisions.

Anyway, this is how I played out my PC's interaction with a god, although not in his full manifest form admittedly. Maybe you can glean somethhing useful from it. If not I hope the read wasn't too boring.

 

[Klaus]

Okay, here's the thing: I want this to be "skin of your teeth" narrow escape, possibly with a few casualties, possibly with a few corruptions.

Escaping from the Dungeon of Demons (Level 1)

You run, sneak, lie, bribe and plead your way out of certain death.

Complexity 5 (12 successes before 6 failures)

Primary Skills (failure = loss of a healing surge; no surges left, failure = loss of 1/4 hp)
Arcana (Hard) -> You use abjuration rituals to avoid detection or keep demons at bay.
Athletics (Medium) -> You take shortcuts through the dungeon.
Endurance (Medium) -> You run like hell.
Stealth (Medium - group check) -> You sneak past opponents.
Bluff (Hard) -> You lie or bribe your way through.

Secondary Skills (a success earns a +2 on an associated skill check)
Dungeoneering (Medium) -> Any.
Perception (Easy) -> Stealth
Thievery (Hard) -> Stealth
Religion (Hard) -> Arcana, Bluff
Insight (Hard) -> Bluff

Special: You can erase one failure by defeating opponents in a combat encounter of a level equal to the number of failures you accrued so far. Healing surges lost through skill failures aren't regained.

Success: You escape the Dungeon of Demons. For each accrued failure above 3, one PC didn't make it out.

Failure: TPK

Special: A PC that doesn't make it out can pledge loyalty to Demogorgon, either by switching alignment to Chaotic Evil (no check) or by making a Bluff (Hard) check. Either way, the PC comes out alive a few minutes after the other PCs.