Seeing the thread on the Cloverfield Monster in 4E made me think of something. Some beasties are just to hard to picture killing with swords and maces by your average heroes, no matter how talented.
What would happen if you came up with a way to kill or defeat an uber powerful creature using a skill challenge?
You could have PCs make checks to figure out its weaknesses, make checks to collapse buildings, or to lure a monster to a certain spot.
Its just kind of an oddball idea that occurred to me, but I was wondering of anyone else had some strange thought about this.
Actually, upon further thought, I wouldn't mind something like being able to banish or bind a god with epic level characters completing a massive skill challenge ritual, instead of making the god into a statted monster . . .
(Of course, this is kind of a moot point for me, since I still GM Pathfinder/3.5, but as a player in a 4E campaign, its an interesting thought)
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What would happen if you came up with a way to kill or defeat an uber powerful creature using a skill challenge?
You could have PCs make checks to figure out its weaknesses, make checks to collapse buildings, or to lure a monster to a certain spot.
I think it is a great idea and certainly within the spirit of the Skill Challenge. And, I think you are on to something with the above - using a high complexity Skill Challenge to build a trap on a massive scale. Or, perhaps a Skill Challenge combined with a Ritual to release a one-shot of enormous power focused on said beastie.
Lots of potential, I think.
I think there are some hints in the 4eDMG for blending skill challenges and combats. I don't have my info with me, but like the crunchy-peanut-butter cup, it sounds like a really good idea if you can work out the logistics.
Hmm... Maybe pay more attention to a monster's skills and have alternating rounds with opposed skill checks, or have characters use their skills to uncover/create vulnerabilities and maneuver to take advantage of them.
Skill challenges during combat is something that's entirely possible (and in fact takes place in a number of official products). An ideal solution, in my mind, would be to fully stat out a monster, but also provide a concurrently-running skill challenge that can play out while the combat is going on. For instance, have the PCs fighting that big bad Cloverfield-style monster, and if someone wants to collapse a building on it, then that's part of a skill challenge. If the PCs are successful, the building falls right on top of it and it loses a big chunk of health. You want to balance the two parts of the encounter, though, so that different characters might be better suited to fighting or participating in the skill challenge.
A slight aside:
I like skill challenges. They seem easy to incorporate into a variety of situations, including combat. I am currently whipping up a skill challenge for my next session, in which between small skirmishes with a forest full of zombies and skeletons, the group is trying to avoid larger more heavily armed undead. I think skill challenges help facilitate these types of cinematic/fun scenes.
As for killing a monster with a skill challenge, sure with the following caveats:
1) The difficulty of the skill challenge should be appropriate to the monster in question.
or
2) some combination included. In other words an Elite monster and a skill challenge that fill up the rest of the XP of the assumed encounter.