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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5937353" data-attributes="member: 42582">Well, my experience is quite different from yours. And I linked above to some actual play reports of skill challenges I've run.I particularly don't agree that there are no decisions to make. My making decisions, the players can change the situation, and therefore change (i) what skills can be brought to bear, or (ii) what the consequences of failure might be. That is exactly getting an advantage by "thinking outside the box".The active opposition has to be provided by the GM's narration. (As it would be in "players roll all the dice" combat.)As for tactical/strategic decisions, it's about using skill checks to change the situation so as to be better able to engage it.Yes. Both to the poverty of the advice (and the much better advice/techniques of narration found in BW, and the other games I mentioned above also) and to the decision points being introduced via adjudication of the checks as the situation unfolds. What I would add is that the rules do talk about this second thing - I quoted them above - they just don't give much advice on how to actually do it. (It's as if the rules said, in relation to combat encounters, "use balanced and interesting mixes of opponents ad terrain" but didn't give the detailed advice on monster roles, terrain types etc, and left it all as an exercise for the GM.)Another yes. With a skill challenge, furthermore, because the players role all the dice, the "rat bastardry" has to be introduced by the GM's narration. Narrate a situation in which the PC's world will come tumbling down unless they act - in which case the players will think about how they can engage the situation, pick up their dice, and start declaring actions!The "tweaks to the system" are described in the DMG. They're not tweaks - they're core. As for "narrative razzle-dazzle", comparing BW or HW/Q style adjudication to (say) GM fiat to keep a PC alive in a 2nd ed Dragonlance game strikes me as a pretty odd comparison or equation of techniques.</blockquote>

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