While they had a troubled start, and many people really don't care for them, I was thrilled that 4th Edition at least made an attempt to make skill-based challenges more interesting. I had struggled with them for years, and while 4th Edition didn't offer a slam-dunk fix it showed me some new directions to try that have really worked for me. In fact, I try to stick to the format in the DMG (though with the updates to the success/failure ratio and skill DCs) as much as possible and use it as a skeleton to be fleshed out with description, and just doing that has brought about some results that I found really enjoyable, though I guess I'm not certain what the players thought of it.

So, by request, here's a thread to discuss skill challenges. Questions, suggestions, and examples are all welcome of course. Criticism is fine, but please try to veer away from complaints like "It should just be roleplayed not ROLLplayed." By participating in this thread, you indicate to me that you at least like the general concept of making certain non-combat challenges into something that requires more than one action or check to complete.

Giving noncombat skills some "crunch time" is a great idea that 4e awkwardly embraced like a junior prom date.  With great enthusiasm and a bit of clumsiness.

"Noncombat challenges" is such a broad category though, ranging from networking a fancy party to eluding a pack of jackals in the desert.  Is there really a good way to give Skill Challenges a bit more meat in general, on the system level, that can be applied to all skill challenges?  Or is dressing them up better handled on a case-by-case basis?

In reply to GreyGriffin (msg # 2):

I think a general framework of a number of skill checks and a number of "strikes," is a good one, that just needs "dressing up" case by case. Fate Core uses a similar approach, though failure there is less arbitrarily determined: https://fate-srd.com/fate-core/challenges. But I feel that goes to show that the basic concept is considered sound.

I'm extremely glad that 4th Edition gave me "permission" to have a preset number of attempts. I can't recall ever really enjoying skill situations I've been in before in which the GM decided that one character ended the whole thing immediately with a massive success, or in which a GM kept asking for checks until they either got they outcome they were looking for (such as rolling until someone managed to save themselves, or rolling until someone failed to hide themselves) or enough rolls had piled up that it was clearly impossible to have any result other than what the dice were saying. With a challenge the way 4th Edition or Fate Core handles them, everyone knows up front when it's done and when there's nothing more than can be tried, so that we can move on and see what happens.

And that's another import thing I like about skill challenges: the exhortation in the rules to make failure something that doesn't slam the door on progress. Vague understandings of what success and failure mean, or allowing for only extreme success or failure (i.e. unraveling the adventure, or killing the character) seemed to be the drivers for a more "mushy" approach that let the GM decide what the difficulty was and when enough rolls had been made. Deciding upfront what victory and defeat look like lets me detach myself from worrying about the outcome. Players still tend to get worked up about it, though, even when I assure them that losing the challenge is intended to be interesting, and even when they have a hand in setting those stakes.

I actually like the analogy of a prom date: it fits perfectly.

Skill Challenges were probably the hardest aspect of 4E for me to integrate. Most of the time when a skill challenge shows up, it breaks the flow of the game. I discovered the trick to a skill challenge was not letting your players know they were in one. Just quietly keep an ebb and flow going, describing progress to your players while not giving them a quick success. Describe setbacks (skill failures) in detail.

This requires a lot of planning. In fact, I would actually argue that even a premade 4E adventure required the GM to read it well in advance, and try to learn what kind of group would be running through it, and what the challenge was trying to describe. Choice of words, degrees of failure...in a lot of ways, it is comparable to a politician or a con artist standing in front of a mirror, and practicing a dozen ways of saying "trust me." This doesn't come naturally: it takes practice to say those two words convincingly when you are lying through your teeth.

So I wouldn't say, "don't use them," but rather I would say, "don't let them break the flow of the game." It has to seem natural. This sounds second nature, but most people who have read these adventures that use them would not be able to tell that, and frankly, neither did I.

This was one of the first bits of good advice the authors came up with after the fact. The initial description in the DMG had you treat skill challenges the same way you ran combat encounters, rolling initiative and taking turns.

To use the prom analogy, it was like starting your first dance with your hand on your date's butt. One not-so-subtle 'hands off' and you move on.

Something else that hindered skill challenges was players not being aware of just how low most skill DCs really are. Especially when they adjusted the numbers in later errata, it was set up so that 'easy' DCs could be done by anyone, 'moderate' was just that, and 'hard' was easy if you were optimized.

To give a concrete example, let's go with Diplomacy. Say you have four characters: Gronk (a half-orc barbarian) with an 8 Charisma and that's it; he's got a –1 to Diplomacy. Eswin the wizard has training in Diplomacy but an average Charisma, so let's say he's got a +6. Misha the cleric has no training but a high Charisma, a +3. And Nebbin the bard is built all around it -- high Charisma, training, maybe even a background bonus, so he's got a +10.

Now, at 1st level an Easy skill DC is 5. Anyone can manage that, even Gronk. If there's no pressure, anyone should be able to take 10 and pass. A Moderate DC is 10, which would be just a little tricky for Gronk but everyone else should be fine. And the Hard DC -- 15 -- is still doable for Eswin, and only a little risky for Misha. Nebbin should basically own this skill all over the place.

The point I'm making here is this: too many players assumed that the skill DCs were a lot higher than listed. (If you only had the 1st DMG, and never followed any of the official stuff, then you'd be a little right.) Because of this, if someone didn't have training in a skill they'd consider themselves to be completely inept at it, even if they had a high supporting stat. Since most skill challenge DCs are supposed to be Moderate, it should be possible for most of the party to attempt anything.

To really make skill challenges work as intended, you have to first take some time to educate the players on how they work. Point out the skill DCs, and make sure they understand that the idea is that they have a chance no matter what. They should only worry about sticking to the optimized stuff if they've blown a few rolls and failure is getting too close.

Once they understand this, then you can drop them into a challenge without fanfare, and just let them work their way through it. If they know you're not going to make skill DCs needlessly high, they should be willing to at least try.

I don't hide them, but I also don't hide anything else. I want the players to know by more than just my powers of description how the challenge is going, and I also want them to understand some of the "moving parts" of the challenge, so they can describe the consequences of their rolls (positive or negative) without waiting for me. That's mainly for the purposes of play-by-post, but I've made the situation clear in table top games too. Seemed to work alright for me, but I guess I can't speak for what the players really thought of them.

I noticed early on that some players don't like being required to participate in a skill challenge, no matter how easy the DCs are. I've mostly given up trying, and I usually try to mix skill challenges with combat or something else, so that characters can contribute to the scene without having to contribute to the skill challenge.

I'm not entirely sure how skill challenges were "intended" to work, and I suppose at this point I don't really care. I figured that the overall takeaway was meant to illustrate that non-combat situations could be handled in a mechanically balanced way, instead of just handwaved.

Well said!

Unlike LonePaladin and Redsun, I don’t hide skill challenges from the players. I find that some players prefer to know, while others prefer not to know, but I prefer when everyone knows, because it provides a structure and a pace to the non-combat encounter scene, so everyone knows exactly when the half-way point, when the climax is, when the moment that you nearly failed is, and when they are on the cusp of success.

I’ve tried a number of different approaches to skill challenges, with varying degree of failure (usually) and very occasionally the rare success (when all the players go – whoa! That was great!).

In one of my current games I’m trying a new approach: GM sets challenging scene and announces skill challenge. Players declare what they do and do not roll. GM announces that everything the players attempted works perfectly, but comes up with one complication per player, that the player must then roll to overcome, with that counting as the failure/success.

I’m not sure if this is working yet, as the limitations of rpol (irregular posting etc) make pacing rather challenging, but hopefully I’m onto something.

I do agree that there has never been an official version of skill challenges that properly worked, and any time I've read an official adventure that uses skill challenges, they always feel a bit weird and repetitive.

That said, it's not too hard to alter the official version of skill challenges to make them work as intended (to help encourage role-playing and grant a sense of challenge and accomplishment outside of combat.)

One of my favorite alterations of skill challenges is the one created/adapted by Rodrigo of Major Spoilers' Critical Hit podcast.  It pretty much goes as follows:



a. Overview: The party is addressed with a challenge. In a cooperative narrative, they work to overcome the challenge by using skills in turn. The players come up with ways to progress the party toward a goal, and the DM determines the skill that applies.

b. Preparation: Loosely storyboard the scenario. Prepare some challenges to pop up if the storytelling becomes stilted or the players have trouble coming up with a way to progress. Determine the results of failure and success. Choose a difficulty for the challenge. Assign a baseline DC based on the level of the party and the desired difficulty of the challenge. A good way to set this metric is by calculating what an average player would roll on a trained skill:  10 + 5 (for training) + ½ level (This is a good starting point, but feel free to tweak it if it seems too easy or hard. In this method, the DC is the same for everything, as it’s a free-form environment and thus very difficult to plan for every contingency.)

c. Set the scene: Describe what challenge the party is facing. Discuss with the players a goal or desired outcome from the scenario.

d. Mechanics: Roll initiative. Characters will attempt to aid the party in initiative order. Any skill which the player can find a relevant use for is an option—with the following two rules:
i. A player may not use the same skill twice in a row
ii. A player may not use the same skill as the one immediately before them
iii.    The player must be able to justify how the skill helps the party advance towards accomplishing the goal.

e. Endgame: Narrate the effects of failures and successes. Adapt the situation to the skills used by the players. Usually, this method uses a set difficulty, so once the final success required is reached, or the final failure, explain how this wraps up the challenge, and discuss whether the goal was achieved and how any failures affected it.


Source:  https://tmblr.co/ZCo6Rv2LhGxTB
This message was last edited by the player at 10:27, Wed 31 May 2017.

I think its important to differentiate between running a skill challenge in person (or on a 'live' medium such as skype) vs running it on rpol. On rpol a system that depends on each player posting in a specific order and within a specified time (like in combat) does not seem ideally suited to that medium. That's why I prefer to use a much looser posting system for skill challenges here, but perhaps it would be better to set up the same posting expectations in players and GM for running skill challenging as in combat situations?

In reply to jacktannery (msg # 9):

Naturally, I'd imagine anything using initiative would have similar posting rules in PbP.  You are right that there is some incentive on rpol to avoid initiative-based posting, so the turn-order-based rule would probably need adjusting to compensate.  But, since each GM I've played under here has handled initiative differently, it's difficult to predict how to make that adjustment to compensate from this thread.  But, many GMs have followed the rule of 'first to post, first in the initiative,' and I think that could work well here.

The key (in my mind) is turning the Skill Challenge into a collaborative narrative.  Anything that encourages players to do that is all for the good.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:02, Wed 31 May 2017.

That's a good description of a desirable function of skill challenges. I think there was a common belief (including by some of the designers) that skill challenges were meant to be a somewhat mechanical minigame, and in that the concept surely fails (though I think there's probably a way to do that).

What never worked for me for skill situations before 4th Edition were:
Lack of easy guidelines for setting DCs.
Lack of easy guidelines for knowing how many checks to make.
Lack of experience award guidelines.
Lack of advice for keeping the game moving despite failure.
Roleplaying and a sense of accomplishment were fairly easy to generate in past versions, I guess, though skill situations always seemed awkward and forced to me.

4th Edition skill challenges at least covered those bases. When skill challenges in 4th Edition haven't worked for me, it has mainly been when people weren't bought into the pacing concept and wanted their one good roll to settle everything, or when players weren't particularly interested in doing things that lent themselves to skills or even ability checks.

Another key problem I ran into early on is that players tended to want to put their best character forward and let that one roll all the checks, pretty much trivializing the challenge. I think the avoidance of that was the intent behind the rules in the DMG that required participation, but yeah, that didn't really work, in general. I think I have ways of dealing with that, though I still don't force anyone to participate.

The purpose of those two (three) rules seems to be to keep players from just spamming their best skill over and over, trivializing the challenge. I understand that impulse, but the trouble I encountered was that it's not always clear in-game why a character can't, or shouldn't, or wouldn't use the same skill again, or the same skill as someone else (it was, arguably, clear enough why, say, using Streetwise to climb a cliff isn't really in the spirit of things).

So, I found that skill challenges needed a lot of description. The example in the DMG actually shows this pretty well, as I recall, with the duke's objections changing as the negotiation continues, and players rising to meet each new objection, rather than just making the same point the same way over and over.

I feel like every skill challenge has to change with each skill check, pass or fail and, ideally, fail in a way that offers a clear opening for another clearly-applicable skill (or several others). I will often have skill challenges "go on the offensive" and directly threaten or challenge the next player or a player who hasn't done anything recently. That player isn't required to act, and isn't required to use the skill or skills indicated; anyone can help them, with pretty much any skill. But I find that when I "target" players and give them a reason to have to do something, they often will, even if it's not their best skill.

The issue I've found with iii. is: Who judges whether a player's justification is adequate? Do people find that rules like that are necessary, or do they find that players generally stay "in bounds?" Do they find that players are hesitant about using certain skills, because they don't want to be told that they can't or shouldn't? Can (or should) a GM or player offer to assist a player with a justification?

I agree that skill challenges work well when they're a collaborative narrative. Apart from encouraging "Yes, and..." though, I don't know that 4th Edition encourages collaborative narration all that much. I use it a lot in D&D, but I feel I mostly get it from other games.

Would anyone be willing to post their notes from a skill challenge they thought went well? Here's one of mine:

Follow the Bouncing Ball
Level: 4, Complexity: 2, XP: 350
The final messenger is bouncing about the battlefield. Keep the drakes from gaining control of it.
- Someone who knows something about drakes (Nature) or is a good mimic (Bluff) can draw the drakes' attention from the messenger.
- Normal attacks tend to enrage the drakes, but standing firm against them (Endurance) or facing them down (Intimidate), will make them hesitant.
- A diving slide (Athletics), a sudden spin (Acrobatics) or a darting hand (Thievery) can knock the messenger back into play.
Successes: [ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ] A successful skill check gains 1 success.
Failures: [ ][ ][ ] A failed skill check, or a successful snatch or bite attack on the messenger (AC 18, Reflex 15), gains one failure.
Victory: The final messenger is freed from the drakes and continues on its way.
Defeat: A spiretop drake (even if the originals have been killed) swoops in and escapes with the messenger.

The scene was that the characters had been tracking a non-flying final messenger released from a destroyed construct. Some drakes liked the shiny object and decided it was theirs. The drakes were involved in the challenge and could force failures on the PCs. The PCs could fight them or otherwise hinder them. I didn't set a specific type of action for the checks in this challenge, and I don't think anyone ever bothered attacking them when it played out, so I don't know if I would have allowed both a check and a standard action attack.

This one went pretty well and the stunts people described were very cool. One thing that I didn't make very clear was that the PCs would not acquire the messenger themselves if they succeeded. That seemed to be what they wanted though, so I probably should have made that the outcome.

The purpose of those two (three) rules seems to be to keep players from just spamming their best skill over and over, trivializing the challenge. I understand that impulse, but the trouble I encountered was that it's not always clear in-game why a character can't, or shouldn't, or wouldn't use the same skill again, or the same skill as someone else (it was, arguably, clear enough why, say, using Streetwise to climb a cliff isn't really in the spirit of things).

[...]

I feel like every skill challenge has to change with each skill check, pass or fail and, ideally, fail in a way that offers a clear opening for another clearly-applicable skill (or several others). I will often have skill challenges "go on the offensive" and directly threaten or challenge the next player or a player who hasn't done anything recently. That player isn't required to act, and isn't required to use the skill or skills indicated; anyone can help them, with pretty much any skill. But I find that when I "target" players and give them a reason to have to do something, they often will, even if it's not their best skill.[/quote]

I feel like the second of those paragraphs almost answers the first.  As the skill challenge goes on, the obstacles change and the skills needed expand.  If you're in a skill challenge with a goal to sneak into an enemy fortress, it's great to start with stealth and sneak up to the back wall.  But, that should only get a group so far before they need to do something other than stealth to continue.  If Player A used Stealth to get the group to that back wall, Player B shouldn't immediately try to use Stealth to do...well...anything.  And, if they ask why they can't, the answer can easily be in the vein of, "Player A's stealth succeeded (or failed) and got you to where you are.  Another stealth check doesn't get you farther, another tactic is needed."  Either the previous skill roll worked or didn't, and the consequences of that skill roll should progress the story enough that it doesn't make sense to use it a second time in a row anyway.



As for who judges the adequacy of player justification, that's always the DM's job, I think.  And, it certainly varies from group to group, so probably shouldn't be determined by people outside the group (like game designers.)  That said, there are some obvious examples that a DM probably wouldn't let fly (at least too often.)

Like, trying to use Diplomacy to encourage your horses to run faster in a chase scene...that's pretty obviously Nature, unless the horses are Awakened in some way.

Or, using History to try arguing that any given situation has happened at some time in history so you remember that example and offer applicable advice.  (That's one that might work on occasion, but probably shouldn't work every time.)

---

To address another point you brought up, you mentioned that when skill challenges didn't work for you, it's because the players didn't buy into the concept...either the concept of needing more than one roll to overcome a challenge or the idea of using skills instead of combat to overcome challenges at all.

That, in my opinion, is an interpersonal issue rather than a system issue.  If players want pure-combat from their game, then that's something that should be discussed so that the players and DM are on the same page and are running/playing the same kind of game.  If everyone wants a pure-combat story, then that's fine and skill challenges have no place.  If everyone wants a story that involves more complex non-combat challenges, I find skill challenges to be an invaluable tool.

But, regardless of the type of encounter we're discussing, I don't think any DM should force an aspect of a game onto a group of players that aren't game for it.  For instance, I have a couple players in my gaming group that don't buy into the ideas of intrigue-themed combat.  They don't like the idea of stealth being part of combat or even invisibility taking a character off the map temporarily.  So, I've learned to use that type of encounter sparingly, if at all.  In my group, either a foe/PC/NPC is on the board and thus is fair game for the combat or they aren't on the board and thus aren't.  If a fleeing foe gets off the battle map, they are free and clear.  Same for fleeing PCs.  Does that remove an aspect of the game and game world?  Yes.  But, if it's an aspect that no one was enjoying, then it wasn't adding that much to the game anyway.  At least, in my opinion.

And contract, if certain skills are deemed as useless or not needed.

That's reasonable if it actually does progress the story. If one is sneaking in someplace, then it might be tricky to explain why Stealth isn't going to help, or to describe a situation in which Stealth isn't going to help.

Not impossible, of course. Stealth could have allowed the PCs to reach the garden maze where a marvelous fountain and high hedges will hide anyone, so now it's a matter of Perception and Athletics. But that would have to be described. Hopefully players would be willing to help describe reasons why a particular skill wouldn't be useful.

Does the DM or do the other players have any obligation to help make a particular use of a skill plausible, if a player wants to use it? Or is the player required to meet the DM's standard on their own?

I wasn't referring to anyone not wanting a skill scene, or only wanting combat, just that not everything some players want to do is easily thought of in skill terms. It's probably mostly an issue with clear explanation and agreed upon goals for both the players/GM and the characters. Not everything a player does in a skill challenge has to be seen as a skill check. I sometimes forget that.

Absolutely. In some of my games, I don't even include the aspect of character death. That's a different discussion, though, one which touched on communication and collaboration, and isn't (to my mind) an exclusively 4th Edition issue.

In reply to engine (msg # 14):

Oh, the players should always explain what they're intending to do with a skill.  I don't think anyone should approach a skill challenge (like sneaking into a fortress) with just, "I roll Stealth," or "I roll Acrobatics."  It should be more like, "I use Stealth to lead the squad past the sentries without being noticed," or "I use Acrobatics to take my longbow, rope, and rope-bridge-building experience to get us across a natural ravine that the fortress uses as a natural defense."  Creative players seem to be able to find reasonable ideas for why just about any skill they want to use should be usable.  In fact, that's one of the best ways to get players involved in minor aspects of world-building.  And, I find that helps get the players invested in the story and world.



One of the things that I do for Skill Challenges is make clear up-front that if a player wants to use an attack or utility power in a Skill Challenge, it's okay to do so as a skill.  Martial Powers are usually Acrobatics or Athletics.  Arcane powers are Arcana.  Primal Powers are Nature.  Et cetera.  There's no reason someone can't adapt a power to a skill challenge, after all...a sorcerer using a spell to light a massive fire as a distraction, a cleric using a prayer to make a potential ally feel better during a diplomatic discussion, a fighter using a charge attack to quickly disable a lone sentry.

I agree with this and the rest of the paragraph, but I mean what if a player wanted to use a particular skill, but was having trouble justifying it. Does the DM have or do other players have any obligation to help the player with their description.

There no reason they can't and I'll support them if they want to, but there is a reason I'd rather they didn't: I don't know how to adjudicate it. Should encounter or daily powers be worth more successes? Should a power enable a complete solution to a skill challenge, or should it just change the nature of the challenge? How fair is it to allow someone to use a power that manages to obviate another player's investment in their skill.

This is part of why I prefer to combine skill challenges with combat. If they want to use a power, they can use it as intended. If they want to use skills, they can use those as intended. Like I said, I'll support anything anyone wants to do, but I don't like the position it puts me in.

See also: rituals used in skill challenges.

I think that a lot of your questions should be answered on a group by group basis...

For my group, if a player uses a power (Daily or otherwise) purely to justify use if a skill, the power is unspent and rolled just like any other skill.  If it is used to give a bonus to a skill, it is spent and grants the mechanical bonus indicated by the power.

For helping players justify skills, players and DMs are under no more or less obligation to assist than they are to recommend a tactic or power use in combat.

True.

Okay, that makes sense. I thought you meant something like using Prestidigitation as a distraction, rather than, say, Bluff.

Maybe obligation is the wrong word. When I see questions about whether a use of a skill is reasonable, I'm put in mind of the DMs I've had (and been) who look for reasons why it isn't reasonable, rather than reasons why it is.

Just reading this whole thread through makes me realise how much variance there is in running skill challenges in 4E. From where they were first presented in the original 4E (2008-ish?) they were a brilliant idea (for D&D - obviously similar had existed in other games before that) terribly executed. Later 4E improved on them but I notice that all of us still enjoying 4E now a decade after it was born have adapted the skill challenge notion to our individual styles. The original concept remains a good idea, but our executions are so individual now, that it's difficult to compare.

I think it would be an interesting idea if a couple of us volunteered to run a short no-work-required skill challenge for the rest of us, to show everyone different ways they can be run. Until you see them in practice its hard to discuss the differences imo.

I used to call this kind of thing a Danger Room, in a nod to the X-Men. I'll make a new thread and people can volunteer to run them and play in them.

That...is actually a specific Utility Power, I think.  Using Arcana in place of other skills, like Bluff, I mean.  So, I wouldn't let a player do so as a matter of course (without using that utility power.)

Well...except that the example of 'a distraction' really isn't unique to Bluff anyway...so, maybe I would, if it was sold convincingly enough.  It's not exactly a 'bluff' to distract a foe with the very real threat of a magically kindled forest fire, after all...XD

In reality, there is a fair bit of overlap in skills during a skill challenge...which is a lot of the fun...seeing how people overcome the obstacles in front of them in unique and varied ways.

I think I've narrowed down what I don't like about Skill Challenges, and I'm not sure why I didn't see it before.  There aren't really any meaningful decisions that the players get to make.

While in combat, you have positioning, powers, pacing, and resources to spend, a skill challenge is just hucking your best dice at the mountain and hoping you climb it. The mechanical levers a player can use to change his odds (or even the context) of a given skill challenge are very limited.  He can flavor text and exposit all he wants, he's still only going to get a Climb check.

The best way to fix this is also the hardest and clunkiest - noncombat Powers that can apply to a broad range of skill challenges, and are dependent on training.

A sort of stopgap would be to add some sort of temporary powers based on level and training to the members of a group, per skill challenge.  This would make them always applicable, but would also require a butt-ton of work to set up for every challenge.

Another issue this runs into is thee rather bare bones conflict mechanics inside a Skill Challenge.  The very simple race mechanics make it difficult to add nuance and complexity without really excavating more space around the core rules.  Although, I have not actually read the expanded Skill challenge rules and clarifications that were in DMG 3(?)

In reply to GreyGriffin (msg # 22):

Yes, that becomes apparent quickly, if the PCs have nothing to do but run up against an abstract challenge.

The solution you offer would be cool, but as you say hard. What I've found works is to make it so that choosing who is going to make a check (and whether or not to make it) becomes a strategic choice on its own. The classic way to do this is to combine the challenge with combat, and require checks to be made from particular locations.

Some further thought does need to go into the exact situation, but that lends at least some strategy to it.

Doesn't 4th edition already have skill powers and utility powers that affect skills built into it?  Or are you referring to something else?

In reply to Godzfirefly (msg # 24):

4th Edition does have "skill powers," (PHB3?) but those are mostly either useful in the abstract, not specifically targeted to Skill Challenges, or they are designed to make skills useful in tactical combat.

Some skill powers could be useful in a skill challenge. Arcane mutterings, for instance, lets you use Arcana to make a Bluff, Diplomacy, or Intimidate check. Others are used between scenes (soothing words is specifically for use during a short rest). And, of course, some were for combat (false bravado let you shake off being marked).

Really, the concept -- utility powers based on specific skills -- was a pretty good idea. It got a few expansions in Dragon magazine, but really it was something they should have thought of earlier than they did.

I mean this as an honest question: how were skill-based situations different from this in past editions? I vaguely recall some slightly more detailed skill proficiencies in Basic D&D, back when thieves were pretty much the only ones with skills, and I think 2nd Edition had some skill mechanics, but at least in 3.5 a Climb check was still just a Climb check. Wasn't it? You didn't state that you prefer the way 3.5 handled it (though I notice you say "Climb" and not "Athletics"), so I don't want to put words in your mouth. I would like to understand what you're comparing to, though.

In the moment, yes, I agree there's not much in the mechanics of skill challenges that allows for much strategy, though players can prepare, and consumable resources can be involved. There are item powers that boost skills, including some consumables. There are also items like the disguise kit or climber's kit that are nice to have on hand. Then again, these options can still be considered "very limited" compared to the options in combat.

Combat, as presented in the books, is very standardized. One can get very crazy with it, but it's safe to make a fair number of assumptions about combat and, in 4th Edition at least, every character is equipped to deal with this specific sort of circumstance.

I think the problem is that non-combat is much, much more varied, in ways I won't belabor. I don't think any mechanical system could hope to capture it well as a general thing. Some skills such as Stealth get very complicated for (as far as I can tell) very little benefit for gameplay or even general strategy. In 3.5 Diplomacy was its own little subsystem that looked like it might produce interesting results but which was so commonly abused that anything like it was kept out of 4th Edition.

I just had another thought, but I'll put it in a separate post.
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:14, Mon 12 June 2017.

The basis of combat is the "action economy" of Move, Standard, Minor. What if skills had something similar, maybe even incorporated a map of sorts? Yeah, I know: more maps? Bear with me.

A standard action is the real meat of a combat turn. Its where you make things happen that change not just the arrangement of the scene, but the underlying "math" of it. You move the pacing mechanisms (primarily HP) along their track toward some kind of end.

A move action generally enables, sets up, or prevents, and usually doesn't do anything itself, except change the visible layout. Combat might not even require anyone to move.

A minor action is often just a bookkeeping sort of thing, or an on-off, like "door open-closed," "sword drawn/sheathed." It usually doesn't change the math, and usually doesn't change the layout, but it might set up the next standard or move action. Again, they're not vital.

So, what if, in a skill challenge (thinking here of something that was, perhaps unadvisedly, on its own like a negotiation) the players, and the skill challenge, had an "action economy," that could be and sometimes would need to be used, and a layout and some "on-offs" that could be changed?

One can try just using repeated "standard actions" to pound on the challenge, as in combat, but throwing in some "moves" and "minors" will help, especially if the challenge is taking actions of its own.

Say the bard takes the fore and uses Diplomacy on the duke, getting in a success. The duke "moves away" from the bard into some "cover," a distraction, say, such as the duke's attractive daughter who flirts with the bard. The bard can spam his standard action Diplomacy again, but it's harder; he'd be better off taking a "move action" to get around the "cover." Or, his ally can use their standard action Intimidate or Bluff to remove the cover, clearing the way. However, his allies are hindered by the "difficult terrain" of courtly manners, which they could overcome with a check, or just accept the penalties from. Meanwhile, the king is moving further away every turn, unless someone can use Insight to call him out, and "mark" or otherwise block him.

The point of that whole mess being that some thing that could represent skill challenges a bit more like actual combat, with obstacles, offense, defense, cover and positioning, it might be possible to get closer to "strategic" challenges that make people feel like they have cool options.

While also making skill challenges take a lot longer, but still....

  Also, keep in mind that the way you use your skills is way more than fluffy window dressing.

  For example, in a recent psuedo-skill-challenge I am running, my players were faced with a canyon they wanted to be on the other side of.  They quickly realized they didn't have the skills to readily cross it as a group, so they chose to climb down into it.  Some used Athletics, some used Arcana, some used their summoned companion to ride down.  But, the way they described climbing/gliding down the canyon (as well as the quality of their rolling) mattered because it determined where they were relative to eachother and the terrain when the first PC touched the canyon floor, where an ambush awaited them.

  So, without maps, special rules, or unusual powers being used, the skills and how they were used mattered to the combat.  One player had chosen to use Arcana to glide down across the river at the bottom of the canyon, so were cut off from the others during the ambush.  Another player failed their climb roll due wearing super heavy armor and not being all that good at climbing, so fell halfway down the canyon.  Some succeeded at the climb rolls, but simply climbed slower than others, meaning they were still quite a distance up the canyon wall when ogres started rolling boulders down at them.

  This wasn't a true skill challenge (just a single skill roll from each player,) but it demonstrates that the way that skills are used can affect the rest of the game.  A well-run skill challenge should have the same type/degree of effects from every skill used, thus affecting the story as much as any combat does.  (Hence the combat-quantity of experience that 4e recommends awarding for a successful skill challenge.)

In reply to engine (msg # 27):

Lots of words, so bear with me once more.

I'm going back in time a bit to offer my own take on this, and the elephant in the room I saw hinted here. Since it has the D&D title, comparing 4E mechanics to its predecessors is entirely expected and acceptable, just as comparing Pathfinder to D&D 3.5 is acceptable due to its derivative status. In prior editions, you used a skill, you passed or failed. Sometimes degrees of success or failure mattered, such as the aforementioned Climb/Athletics check (in older editions, failing by 5 or more was very painful).

Most of the time, you use a skill in 4E, its the same mechanics as a prior edition.

A Skill Challenge does not work this way. Done as written, it breaks immersion. "Oh, a skill challenge." A chain of multiple skill rolls need to be done, with a certain number of successes needed to be obtained before a certain number of failures comes up. And it's strange that a combat doesn't have this same effect, but it doesn't, oddly enough.

Let's take one I ran for myself, in Thunderspire Labyrinth. Here the players encounter what is, based on my understanding of game mechanics, Vecna himself. No interest in fighting, he just wants to know what they want with his repository of knowledge, and what they are willing to give to get it. Intimidation gets one auto failure per use, as it laughs at you. The goal is twelve successes before six defeats.

You have to use Arcana, Religion, History, Diplomacy and Bluff, that last being very conditional. An Insight check reveals this thing can be fooled, and opens Bluff up, but while Bluff has a low target number, the successes are limited (as are Diplomacy's) and the moment Bluff fails, he's having none of that anymore.

Now, let's break down what we are doing for a moment. While this sounds really good on paper, this really isn't.

First, Fighter's got zero contribution to this, and in fact makes things worse. Go sit on the sideline and twiddle your thumbs. "But what about assist another rolls?" Assuming they even recall those exist (a lot of players forget), most players do not like being support, especially if they picked Fighter, the front and center of the group.

Rogue's next. Assuming she took Bluff, she has a contribution and likely a strong one if they are a Cunning build (maybe they have Insight, although at reduced effectiveness), at least until they blow a check: then go join the Fighter. If they didn't because they are Strength based and chose Wisdom, they'll probably have Insight, and then they are going to be with Fighter on the sidelines, because now they got nothing unless they have Bluff at reduced effectiveness.

Let's say member five is a Paladin, because why not: double Defenders means a strong front line. Diplomacy might or might not be a class skill he possesses: odds are maybe 66%, depending on build and inclination of the player. Insight also has a decent chance of being on the table, especially if they are the 33%. They will have something to contribute, unless they are one of the unlucky ones that have neither skill. So a small chance they will be doing nothing: Paladin's got a good chance of being in a strong position. He'll have Religion guaranteed, but not at a good roll.

So that leaves Cleric and Wizard, who have these skills, with the Cleric often being subpar at them for the same reason the Paladin is.

So let's break down what History/Religion/Arcana mean in the context of this situation: You are giving a god of evil information that he deems sufficient to be worth risking a servant of his for, either telling him something new, or confirming something he suspected. The Wizard might not have an issue with this, but the Cleric (and our earlier Paladin) if good aligned should honestly have severe issues with this idea.

Now, you CAN tell Vecna to go visit the Nine and take a long one from Asmodeus, but that just results in Vecna taking his ball and going home (failure condition), with the translation of that being "hope you didn't need those surges, encounters or one daily for the rest of this adventure." At LV7 or LV8, this really hurts, especially given what's waiting in here.

What's that? You don't want to serve evil but don't want to pay the price? Hope your group has Bluff, Insight and Diplomacy, and then give those players the floor and go do something else, or else start doing assist another checks. Until the group realizes you can only get four successes each with Bluff and Diplomacy each under the best of circumstances, meaning you HAVE to play his game, although with eight successes (being optimistic here), at least the loss of resources is much lower.

Let's say the group is okay with this situation though, maybe because they aren't thinking about it or maybe because they believe taking down the bad guy that is right here is more important than a scheme Vecna has tomorrow. When doing Arcana, Religion or History rolls, the player has no idea what they are giving Vecna that equals a DC22. You can roleplay Bluff and Diplomacy, which is interactive. Knowledge really isn't: you (the player) have no idea what you are giving him, and if you try to downplay the information and go for common stuff, that's too low of a DC, and isn't what you are giving up.

Of course, you could just figure Vecna already knows all this stuff, and is just being a troll to see the heroes squirm under playing his game, which means this entire skill challenge is nothing but an act of sadism the players cannot avoid or turn around on the one issuing it, which can actually cause the players to resent the story itself (or the DM who used it) if they figure that out.

You pass? Everyone loses a healing surge anyways. This was one of my first run ins with this system, by the way, before I learned the hard way not to run this system as is. Not a very good positive impression, even if some of this is just bad writing IMO. (Seriously, a GOD should not be standing in front of a LV7 group's path.)

You could say this whole situation is a result of bad writing, which is a legitimate counterpoint. But the essence of the situation is often the same, and frequently large chunks of the skill challenge idea need to be either disregarded or outright homebrewed to make a smoother situation, if the prior posts on this topic are any indication. At the very least, if only one or two players are going to have the floor, reduce the length and requirements of the challenge (technically a house ruling, but an acceptable one) or just make it a straightforward skill check (pass/fail) to keep the game flow going.

Also, some players will have those skills, but they will be subpar at them, and a subpar skill use often just adds a failure, making things closer to worse. This does not encourage interaction, because doing nothing doesn't deteriorate the situation, barring a DM ruling saying that's a automatic failure, and that can cause its own set of problems (such as skill challenges that require everyone to make an Endurance check, with consequences for everyone if half or more fail, or a duke who keeps looking from person to person asking what they think, with consequences if they commit a faux pas).

And then there is the last part: the challenge ends when a certain number is reached. This can feel very artificial, barring - again - careful DM preparation. And if this is a premade adventure, DM preparation is a throw of the dice, depending on the DM in question, as they may have assumed the adventure would have that sort of thing in advance for them.

So yes, skill challenges are flawed. A good idea, but rather clunky in execution. Generally once they are over, either the party gains something, hold the status quo, or loses resources but make it past. Or worse. they have to redo the challenge with lost resources. A combat allows everyone to pull their weight, to show what they can do in a direct fashion which can be seen and measured. Skill challenges often combine the worst of both RP sessions and mechanical ones.

I feel like your example is mostly just an example of the worst possible method of running a Skill Challenge.  I mean...why would a GM design a challenge that specifically excludes any player?  It's like knowing a player is built for melee-only and designing a battle where only ranged combat is effective.  Or designing a combat where the foes resist all non-magic effects, making the Fighter and Rogue useless.  Or design a combat where arcane powers are unusable due to an anti-magic field, so the Wizard is useless.

It's arbitrarily bad design and not the fault of the Skill Challenge framework.  It's the fault of the campaign/adventure designer who didn't consider their group when creating the challenge.  (And, I can absolutely say there were some bad pre-made adventures designed for 4e, as there have been for every edition.)
This message was last edited by the player at 21:24, Tue 13 June 2017.

I've made a challenge myself a few years back for a campaign I was running where my players were soldiers on a battlefield. That's what I just put up on the Danger Room.

Let's look at what was excluded for a moment: Acrobatics, Bluff, Dungeoneering, Nature, Religion and Thievery. My original challenge did not account for these things. Not to say they couldn't find a use, such as Acrobatics and la parkouring the way across the battlefield, but Athletics would more represent over a field of war; it's why Fighters have it. Bluff could be used in place of Diplomacy, but soldiers are already not inclined to believe misinformation as it is, usually following the last given confirmed order, so it would likely result in a failure the moment the enemy either asks for name and rank, or notices your distinct lack of hobgoblin characteristics (at higher levels, though, or from a half-orc, changeling, or monster race...). Dungeoneering, Nature and Religion simply aren't helpful here (although with a change in circumstance and terrain they could easily stand in for Arcana and Streetwise or be valid alongside them), and Thievery would either compromise a hardened position (enemy or ally) or pin the party down into a static position as they were forced to hold it off against a determined enemy. (Could be really useful for a siege, though...)

Heal could be modified to benefit the whole party, but I wanted it to have that 'focused medical attention' feel, and maybe give the receiving player a chance to say something like "I ain't got time to bleed." That or "Heal ME!" from less awesome ones. A lot of these are mathematically the same to assist checks, but they are either party wide, +4, or if those are not true, at least a skill the player invested in, which actually does work on psychology and positive player morale.

Most players will have at least one of those skills mentioned. A Warlock (by taking Bluff, History, Religion, Thievery) could insure he only gets one useful turn, which I felt was a specific enough circumstance to be an acceptable risk. Hybrids or those who took a Background skill swap could cut themselves off from options they should otherwise have. I literally tried to make characters that would not have a good option they could use every turn in this challenge.

Most skill challenges will not be this thoroughly stress tested before launch.

That's one problem with the skill challenge: the whole group has to be involved. Otherwise, why not just use normal skill tests? Hell, diplomancing with Duke von Boredomhind for even three rolls straight with normal skill tests will often have those not built for talking looking for something to do. You make it a Skill Challenge, and they will probably break out their cell phones or their laptops and start playing Hearthstone or Bejeweled.

All skill tests have this problem, but a skill challenge effectively "locks in" the skill test for a prolonged time. So if the party is locked in (like say, in a combat), they better be able to do something. Your analogy of a combat that excludes the melee characters is right, and a scary high number of these end up feeling just like that.

Let's make a second example: The first real skill encounter a new player could hit is encounter W5 in Thunderspire Labyrinth - Chatting with the Dead: Arcana, Dungeoneering, Athletics, Diplomacy, with a single use of Insight and the use of Bluff if the party actually is a bunch of jerks. Basically, they try to find out if the party has any moral worth and base their aid off of that. The spirits move on either way, either wishing them luck or mocking their impending deaths, and give information based off successes earned.

Sounds good, actually. Now let's look at what's going to happen, even IF all of these skills are in possession.

One guy is going to be power-flexing in front of the clerical ghost of Kord until he hits those two maximum successes and gets ignored for the rest of the challenge. The guy with Insight is going to get their one success by calling the wizard out as a braggart and then do whatever. The Diplomacy check is a DC26 for a LV5 group, which for a Charisma-based Paladin who actually took Diplomacy will average a required roll of 13 to pass (assuming maximum Charisma), because these ghosts believe in action, not words, despite the fact that any action you do isn't something they actually care about. So that leaves the wizard or resident caver talking shop with the dead wizard with DC22 checks. Intimidate checks (a pattern in this book after the very first skill challenge, which I'm not counting because it has no real consequences) cost you automatic failures, and most players won't be able to Bluff, because they probably ARE heroic (if they aren't, this test will become an exorcise in hilarity; same difficulty as Diplomacy).

I keep bringing this book up because I don't discuss theory very well. I use what I have seen and experienced for myself, and for most new players and DMs coming into 4E, they are likely to hit the Against Orcus adventures first, for better or worse. You can discuss all the theory you want, but this is often how these things end up going.

A need to involve everyone is a problem, but I don't see it as a problem with skill challenges themselves. Most games with skill systems are going to have situations where involving everyone is going to seem rather contrived.

As a player, I don't let a low skill dissuade me from participating, but I understand the impulse not to do harm. In addition to making an effort to make sure that there's always something going on besides a skill challenge (usually either combat or another skill challenge), I like to do what I can to encourage low-skill characters to try. I've had mixed success, but I generally like to put in something that either applies a cost for not dealing with the challenge or that causes the challenge to edge closer to failure if it's not dealt with.

It also almost always helps to keep a skill challenge moving quickly, so that if anyone doesn't feel like they can contribute, at least it doesn't take much longer than it takes to make a handful of dice rolls. One advantage to not having a lot of strategy to consider: fewer moves to choose from.

The two examples of actual skill challenges were instructive, but I'm going to ask that we veer away from that from now on in this thread, to put more focus on how skill challenges can work, rather than their (rather notorious) problems. That said, if there's a particular aspect of a specific skill challenge that you would like to figure out how to work, and you'd like input, then certainly bring up specifics.

Revisiting skill DCs in a challenge.

I've found it's generally a good idea to include one or two skills that use the easy DC, but limit them to one use each. These give the untrained characters something they can attempt without significantly risking the whole deal, while limiting them prevents optimized characters from exploiting them.

That said, it helps if:

1. The players know that these options are available, and that they're within reach of everyone, and
   
2. The optimized players don't hog them for themselves.

You could use an easy skill to reduce the DC of a harder skill, putting it within reach of more of the party. Or you could have that easy skill permit the use of a different skill that would otherwise not be available.

What would it take for it not really to matter if a player risked the whole thing? And I mean, irreparably, not like, Mialee has to fix Regdar's screw up. Just now it's either going to be harder, or that was the last failure and they've lost.

It will vary from table to table, of course, and realistically some groups won't be able to stomach failure at all, but a lot of the problems stem from players not wanting to participate (or not wanting players to participate).

Yeah, I know it's an odd idea: why have a "challenge" if losing it isn't supposed to feel rougher than winning. But the rules already advise not making it too rough (i.e. don't allow it to hard stop the adventure) so it seems to me to be in the spirit of skill challenges that they're meant to be about group participation, more than beating them optimally.

I just found an alternative way to resolve skill challenges. Here's the full document if you want to read it yourself:

http://www-personal.umich.edu/...%20system%20v1.2.pdf

Here's a brief summary.

1. Divide the challenge into three segments. Each segment could be a single round of activity, or a few minutes of talking, or an hour of effort. Depends on what's being done.
   
2. Each player describes what they're doing during that segment. The DM decides on an appropriate skill. The DC is roughly equal to a Hard skill DC for their level + 2.
   
3. The DM has everyone roll, and counts the number of successes. Failed rolls at this stage have no effect other than not counting toward the end goal.
   
4. Repeat these steps for the second and third segments, then add up the total number of successes. For a 5-member party, 8+ successes mean the challenge succeeds; 6-7 successes grants a partial victory, and 5 or fewer indicate failure.

There are other rules allowing for use of action points, spending healing surges, and multi-part challenges. But this looks like an interesting way to handle the concept, and it encourages people to try even with sub-optimal chances.