Help me expand this skill challenge!


4th Edition

RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32

Hey everyone, I'm looking for some feedback on this skill challenge I wrote. I think it's OK, but it's looking a little flat to me. I'd like some suggestions on how to spice it up a bit, and possibly expand the skill list.

Safe Path to Xandrar

The party is trapped behind enemy lines, and must move through territory patrolled by enemy units to reach a friendly city.

Complexity: 6 successes before 3 failures
Primary Skills: Perception, Nature, Stealth
Secondary Skills: Insight, Diplomacy, Bluff, Intimidate

Perception: (DC: hard)
Success: The character spots a landmark, allowing the group to move forward.
Failure: The character spots what he believes to be a landmark, and the group moves in the wrong direction. Make a group Stealth check to avoid being spotted by an enemy unit.
Assists: Yes

Nature: (DC: hard (if the party has the map of the area from the enemy hideout*, reduce DC to normal))
Success: The character finds a path or shortcut that leads closer to the city.
Failure: The party wanders aimlessly in the woods, wasting valuable time. Make a group Stealth check to avoid being spotted by an enemy unit.
Assists: Yes

Stealth: (DC: normal)
An enemy unit may have spotted the party!
Note: this skill can only be triggered by a failed Perception or Nature check.
Success: The party is able to sneak by the enemy unit, avoiding combat. (Alternately, aggressive parties may choose to ambush the enemy unit, in this case, the enemy unit is wiped out with no damage dealt to the party)
Failure: The enemy unit encounters the party. A failure on this check does not count towards the number of failures on the skill challenge, however, move to the "enemy unit" sub-challenge. (Note, if the party tried to ambush the enemy, move directly to a Failure on the Enemy Patrol Sub-challenge)

Enemy Patrol Sub-Challenge
The party can bypass the enemy unit by using social skills: Bluff, Intimidate, or Diplomacy. Each enemy unit has one Normal DC social defense and two hard DC social defenses (determine the Normal DC skill randomly each time a unit is encountered) An Insight check (normal) will allow the party to determine which defense is weakest.
Apply the following modifiers to any checks made in this sub-challenge:
+5 Good Roleplaying
-5 Poor/No Roleplaying
-5 Party is wearing uniforms of their home country's military
+5 The party offers bribes of at least 100gp.

Success: The party avoids the enemy unit without bloodshed, and does not suffer a failure towards the skill challenge
Failure: The party dispatches the enemy unit in a noisy melee. The party suffers a failure towards the skill challenge. In addition, each party member loses one healing surge, and each party member must roll a d6 for each of their Daily Powers. On a roll of a 1, that power is expended. for the day.

*This is an item the party may find previously in the campaign.


I don't really see the problem. Looks pretty good to me.


I think it might be handy to add in a few more skills that can be used in the main challenge (as right now, all the secondary skills only come up in the side challenge.)

Some options:

Athletics (DC Easy) - Primary Skill
After finding a safe path outside enemy notice along the gully of a ravine, the party needs to scale the sheer cliff-side at the end to get back on the proper path.
Requirement: This skill is unlocked after at least one successful Perception check, which spots the option of the safe path through the ravine.
Success: The character scales to the top of the cliff and safely drops a rope down to bring the others up, earning one success for the challenge and bringing the group closer to their goal.
Failure: The character scrambles to the top, but not without difficulty. They lose one healing surge from the effort, and the sound of crashing debris may alert their foes. Make a group Stealth check to avoid being spotted by an enemy unit.
Restriction: This skill can only be used once.

History (DC Medium) - Secondary Skill
The wildlands have a history all their own, and have been the site of many skirmishes before. A few carefully recalled facts can help steer one's companions towards key landmarks in the region, or tell them what forest paths are best to look for.
Success: The character offers sound advice to his companions. This does not provide a success itself, but instead, for the rest of the challenge, any natural d20 rolls of 15-20 for Perception or Nature checks provide an additional bonus success.
Failure: The character's memory is spotty and his advice is poor, providing a -2 penalty to the next Perception or Nature check made in the challenge.
Restriction: No character can attempt this check more than once, and it is no longer available after any character succeeds at it.

---

To give a bit more explanation: I find things like the second option above (the History check) are good for helping expanding the skill list without making things too easy. Adding in secondary skills that can help the challenge allows an option for characters who aren't good at the core skills, and want to contribute but don't want to risk a bad check completely hurting the party.

The Athletics check, meanwhile, is one of the ways to spice things up a bit - essentially adding one-check 'scenes' that are available at different parts of the challenge. You've basically already got this in the form of the sub-challenge (and I really like the way you've handled that.) But it means that a successful party doesn't have anything exciting going on - they make some Perception and Nature checks, and get there without any memorable moments.

So instead, I'll often have those main skills unlock other options that can only be used once. The Perception check to find a safe path through a ravine, with an Athletics check to get out at the end (as above). Or you could have a Nature check bring them onto an old Fey path in the woods, which can be then further activated by an Arcana check to disguise their path behind them. They can stumble on a shrine to Avandra, where they can give a quick prayer to gain a boon of speed as they move forward. Etc.

You don't need to completely fill things out with them, and you certainly don't want the PCs to ever feel like they must succeed at these checks in order to move forward (since then you are just rail-roading them through a list of locations.) But instead, having them find these locations with the option to make use of them gives them some occasional other skills to use - and, even if the locations go unused, it makes the trip feel more like a real journey, as opposed to just moving from point A to point B through a series of checks.

You can even go one step further and make up a full table of 'scenes' that you can randomly roll for after each check - though at that point, the challenge is starting to grow potentially more and more complicated than you might want it to be. :) I definitely think the challenge as it currently stands works just fine on its own, but that adding a couple interesting scenes or secondary skill checks will definitely help liven it up.


One thing that I'm not seeing is what happens if the party fails the skill challenge. I can imagine them being engaged by an enemy patrol and having similar (but harsher) consequences to what happens when failing to dispatched an enemy unit in melee. Or the party could find their way to town, but taking more time which makes the next part of the adventure harder for them due to lack of time or such.

For Stealth, does just one person have to make the check, or do a certain number of party members need to make the check to avoid failure?

I'm not entirely sure which things give successes and which give failures for the skill challenge.

To me the things that give successes are: Perception, Nature, Stealth, and the Sub-Challenge
And the things that give failures are: Perception, Nature, Stealth (but only if they were attempting to ambush, and the Sub-Challenge

I just want to set out how I believe it is working to make sure I'm not making bad assumptions.

Right now, there seems to be very few options for the party to attempt. If a party member doesn't have Nature or Perception, there is little for them to successfully add themselves (aside from aiding) until the party runs into a patrol.

I might suggest a number of other skills to allow the party to take harsher, but more direct paths to the goal.

Like an Athletics check to cross a fast moving river or Acrobatics to successful leap from stone to stone along the river (rather than following it's length until it becomes easier to pass).

History might reveal knowledge of an old, practically forgotten path through the mountains.

Edit: Or what Matthew Koelbl suggests and explains a lot better than I did

RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32

Hey guys, thanks for the suggestions! I'll definitely add some of those to the skill challenge.

Success on this challenge will result in the party getting an advantage (perhaps a surprise round) in a battle that occurs directly after the challenge. I wasn't going to make failure terribly bad, because if the party fails, it probably means that they will be short on healing surges and dailies.

RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32

What I ended up doing is adding a whole additional Sub-challenge. Each time the party passes a Perception check, they spot a landmark, thus opening the Sub-challenge related to that landmark. There are four landmarks that I wrote, each with one or two usable skills. This should allow me to keep the narrative flowing a bit, and also expands the skill usage. Thanks again for the suggestions.

This challenge is going to be the opening scene of tonight's session, so we'll see how it goes.


Rock on, and let us know what happens! I definitely like that approach as the skill challenge unfolds along the way, and I'm eager to hear how it goes.

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