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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 9381029" data-attributes="member: 42582">I think the biggest technical issue for playing 5e in a "story now" style is how to handle action resolution and consequences. Framing is fairly straightforward - even when improvising, D&D (all versions, including 5e) has heaps of pre-build encounter elements (NPCs, creatures, maps, etc) that you can use for framing - but how do you resolve declared actions?You could try and use "Intent and Task" (a la Burning Wheel: <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/98542/burning-wheel-gold-hub-and-spokes" target="_blank">DriveThruRPG</a>), but a lot of actions in 5e don't require a check and so can't be resolved this way. And suppose that a player declares "I pick <so-and-so's> pocket, looking for gold!" There are rules for working out if the pocket is picked, but how do you work out if there is gold, and if so how much? BW (for instance) has rules for the difficult of scavenging up or otherwise looting 1D of coins, but 5e D&D doesn't. 4e D&D has treasure parcels, but 5e doesn't. I don't know 5e well enough to have good suggestions for solutions here.Another (related) question is how to establish finality in non-combat resolution. Adapting skill challenges from 4e might be one possibility, and then trying to find a way of converting the use of (fictionally appropriate) spells etc to successes; but 4e uses a simple and uniform currency  (encounter power, daily power, ritual) whereas 5e has level-based effects, and so you might need to work out a new scheme for translating from ability/spell usage to success.To elaborate a bit on the issue I'm talking about in the previous paragraphs, consider: in an Athletics-type check for a skill challenge, what benefit to the check does a rogue get from their Second Story Work ability? The ability as written seems to assume that the GM has a map drawn and has a "timeline" running and the benefit (if any) of the ability is determined as an outcome of the degree to which it lets the PC move across the map in a shorter time. But in a "story now" context, where there is no pre-drawn map and no pre-decided timeline, what benefit does a player get to their check from the fact that their character is quicker when climbing? Maybe advantage? Anyway, I think this is something that would need to be thought through.I think a secondary issue is that a lot of 5e is balanced around the "adventuring day", which creates pressure on the GM to think in terms of collections of events (encounters), rather than one situation at a time. I think "story now" 5e might want to handle this in a mostly informal way. Or perhaps you could require some sort of test/check to safely make camp, with failure meaning that the PCs have to go on with their current body of resources - maybe with a bonus per hit die spent (so it is easier as the PCs become more weary).Also, you might find this thread helpful: <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/advice-for-new-story-now-gms.698281/" target="_blank">Advice for new "story now" GMs</a></blockquote>

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