LostSoul
Adventurer
Are you talking about the mechanical (character-building) choices they make, or the action/narrative, in-character choices they make?
I see mechanical and narrative (I usually call it "colour") choices as two halves of the same coin.
If the challenges are always tied to your skills, there isn't a need to "scrounge for bonuses" - e.g. if you're a bunch of Streetwise punks with nary an Arcana, Religion, or History skill between you, and you know you're going into The Library of Ioun, hiring a sage might be something to consider. You won't need to make choices on that level. These are usually narrative-based choices, but they're being made because of a mechanical need.
The same thing goes for combat encounters - if they are always tied to your abilities, you don't need to worry about doing things like buying Holy Water or Radiant weapons. (These are usually mechanical-based choices, but if you're only fighting for narrative-based reasons, the two feed back into each other; I find this sort of play more satisfying than one over the other.)
If you are always up to the task mechanically, you don't need to engage the setting as much in order to overcome the challenge.
This is why I see mechanics and colour as two halves of the same coin - the narrative decisions you make are influenced by the mechanical resources you can draw on ("Do we really want to fight undead when we have no one who can deal Radiant damage?"), and the mechanical resources you have are influenced by the narrative decisions you make ("Let's tell the Temple of Bahamut about the undead and see if they will lend us a hand.").
One informs the other and forces decisions to be made, on both levels.
This is interesting, and there's a lot to be said about the merits and drawbacks of different methods for designing skill challenges. For instance, "If the player chooses Intimidate over Religion, why force him into a skill challenge involving deep theological discussions?"
A big part of the fun and "value-add" of a good skill challenge is that it produces an interesting, directed yet non-deterministic group narrative. Of course success or failure in the challenge is important to "what happens next" in the big picture. But the journey is also part of the fun, and part of the point!
I totally agree; that's why I like the kind of mechanical resolution a skill challenge provides. It surprises the DM as well. You go into the skill challenge, a player has his character do something that changes everything, and you come out the other side with something completely different!
I am trying to look at what the rules say (I'm considering all the advice as rules, sue me, I'm crazy), what sort of play is "pushed" by the system, and how things have changed over time.
If someone wants to compile a list of articles from Dragon and Dungeon that talk about skill challenges, that would be awesome. I'm busy trying to figure out what a mad tiefling starlock was trying to do with oralloy.