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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 6578101" data-attributes="member: 82106">Isn't the answer here simple? You build a boat. One way or another your character, determined to succeed, manages to construct a boat. Given that it has no narrative weight beyond adding a boat to your equipment inventory there's no need to roll dice for it. Pay the GP cost of a boat and its yours. You can then narrate that your character spends his next several weeks of downtime working on the project. While 3.5 generates an 'exact' time, its really no more exact than 'it takes a while' and with no real time pressure or whatnot the details shouldn't matter, right?Well, as of some very early 4e errata, all SCs fail after three failures, and the complexity of the task determines the successes required, anywhere from 4 to 12 successes. There aren't codified types exactly, though by example there are some 'patterns' you can follow. So, yes, the players would know that an easy challenge, something important but well-within their abilities, is 4 successes before 3 failures, with all 4 being moderate DC checks. A typical challenge has 7 associated skills, 2-3 secondary and the other 4 or 5 primary. It is of course up to the DM which is which, but in an easy challenge it wouldn't matter much. This might correspond with a party in a village building a boat where they have access to advice, tools, and materials. The exact situation will dictate. Endurance would be good if say the boat must be built very quickly. If OTOH there's no real time pressure I'd say its not germane. Players CAN suggest skills, but the idea is that the DM designs encounters (and an SC is an encounter). So the DM should pick roughly 7 skills, though less might be appropriate in some cases. Several will be primary, about 4-5 typically. These are skills that can be exercised again and again to advance the challenge, though the DM is free to use narrative to impose some restrictions here, insisting that for instance an Athletics check succeed to drag the trees to the water before a Perception check can be used to find the best parts to cut planks from. The other 2-3 skills are considered secondary, they might contribute at most one success, or they could 'unlock' other primary skills, give a bonus to a check, etc.Anyway, the Rules Compendium has a pretty clear and fairly straightforward writeup that players should read up on if they're interested in system mastery. It also talks about 'advantages', which are a resource that the PCs can 'play' to help them succeed (again with some sort of narrative justification required), and some quantity of hard DC checks the DM can impose. Its definitely not all perfectly cut and dried, a DM can 'make things harder' on a party, but only within the prescribed limits.The DM is free to construct narrative complications, but all of the action in an SC really SHOULD be related to a single overall goal or event. After all its one challenge, it would be incoherent for it to cover multiple unrelated goals. The example you give seems OK, but remember that SCs and challenges in general are meant to apply to a group. The advice is N+2 skills, where N is the number of characters, with 2-3 being secondary, but in a case of 1 solo adventurer I think we'd stick to one secondary skill and 2 primary, with 1 being social and the other being physical or knowledge related. I think DMs need to carefully consider when challenging a single character, this is definitely a bit outside the mainstream of the SC guidelines, though you can make it work OK. As for if complications are 'just for the sake of drama', I'm not sure what that means. The whole idea that the task is challenging is fundamentally dramatic in origin. People have been building boats with zero drama for ages. Consequently we must assume that as part of an adventure the building of this boat is in some way challenging and dramatic. I would note that skills aren't the ONLY resources that characters have. The 'hermit druid' for instance has an animal form, and probably rituals and powers that allow him to summon and talk to animals, sneak around, etc. He might not be all that bad at getting back his tools!</blockquote>

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