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Message: <blockquote data-quote="KarinsDad" data-source="post: 5468750" data-attributes="member: 2011">Well, I agree that there are plenty of possible encounters. But that's not how the SC was set up.Meet some NPCs. Negotiate with them. Fight them. Flee them. Meet some monsters. See some interesting swamp feature. There's plenty of options.The only monsters in the SC that I was discussing were a few snakes on one day out of twelve. There were some herbs to find one day. And a boat to find one day.Now, a given DM might just throw other interesting encounters on top of the SC that was presented, ad hoc. He didn't have Lizardmen in the SC, but now he does. He didn't have an old man with a coon hound listed in the SC, but now he does.To me, ad hoc encounters are fine, but they are similar and only a tiny bit preferable to the random monster generator tables from earlier editions. Most ideas that the DM comes up with pre-game tend to be better thought out and fleshed out on average than ad hoc ideas that he comes up mid-game. To me, ad hoc ideas are a further fleshing out of the overall adventure set up, not a way to introduce multiple new encounters on the fly. Those tend to be less satisfying overall. IMO. YMMV.For this particular scenario, I would think that it should be designed like a dungeon (or a flowchart). There are x number of encounters, some roleplaying, some combat, some environmental. If you go from one encounter to the next, a few skills might or might not be rolled. The overall swamp has a few required skill rolls at certain points in time between encounters, Endurance for disease, Nature for navigation.But if there are not going to be any significant encounters in the scenario, then yes, a few skill rolls to determine how long it took and any disease acquisition and whether the PCs get hopelessly lost. If successful enough, the PCs take X number of days to get through the swamp, and they are there. If they took 9 days, then the temple is 60% inhabited. 10 days? 75% inhabited. A lot of this type of cause and effect can still be done, just most of it is done off camera with just a few skill rolls total.If the scenario has encounters, then it is a lot more interesting. It is still not a skill challenge, the swamp itself is a dungeon with some skill checks involved and some encounters involved. And Jester's idea that the PCs just do not find their way through the swamp is still viable.If there are not going to be any enjoyable encounters (combat or not) in the trek, then why waste the time with 120 skill rolls and a few hours of pontification of what minor things happen to the PCs while they are in the swamp based on their skill check rolls and how they try to interact with the swamp. Is interacting with a swamp that doesn't have a single NPC or neat puzzle or other real challenge listed really fun and heroic?This is the wonkiness I see in most SCs that I have read. And it's probably part of the reason that the OP wrote the post here.</blockquote>

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