About to start a role-play focused game with little combat. I want to add more skill based challenges and have thought of using 4e's system in PF. Has anyone done so or can you point me to a thread around here where its dealt with?
About to start a role-play focused game with little combat. I want to add more skill based challenges and have thought of using 4e's system in PF. Has anyone done so or can you point me to a thread around here where its dealt with?
Fourth edition's skill challenges are a bad mechanic. They stack things in such a fashion to almost require twinking on skills to make the challenges. Because of how the math workd, you end up with a success margin biased strongly against lucky chances and very much towards high skills.
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About to start a role-play focused game with little combat. I want to add more skill based challenges and have thought of using 4e's system in PF. Has anyone done so or can you point me to a thread around here where its dealt with?
PFRPG already has backdoor skill challenges - take a look at the first issue of Curse of the Crimson Throne. It has a chase scene that is practically the same thing as the skill challenge mechanic.
Owner - Enchanted Grounds, President/Owner - Enchanted Grounds
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Skill challenges are also being used in Paizo's Pathfinder Society modules. The Delirium Tangle (? - very recent, the one Crystal Frasier wrote) and The Pallid Plague both used them, or variations of them. The PFRPG Corebook also refers to "assists" in the section on skill checks, using almost the exact same mechanic that 4E uses.
So far, the problem I'm seeing with the PF versions that I'm referring to above is that there isn't a cap on how many times you can use one skill. In The Delerium Tangle (still not sure about that title), for instance, you can use perception over and over to make your way through the challenge. At no time did the DM say, "You can't use that any more," or even present something differently to get us to not abuse the half-elf rogue's +22 on that skill, with the five extra players at the table making it an additional +2 to +10 on every check.
4E specifically limits the number of times you can use a specific skill. For instance, in a scene where characters are being chased by wolves, you might be able to use handle animal once, dropping some food in a likely place to distract them. You can't do it over and over until you escape the wolves. You subsequently have to use stealth to slip by them, survival to wipe out your trail, climb to make your way up an obstacle that they wouldn't be able to climb, etc.
I think, so long as you introduce different aspects of the challenge that need to be overcome, the system would translate very easily to PFRPG. I've used it multiple times while running a home group, and players have loved it (though, admittedly, they had no actual idea that they were doing a skill challenge - they just thought they had a lot of different skill checks they needed to make).
Honestly, blasphemous as it sounds, pick up the 4E DMG2. It has some very good, non-edition specific tips and ideas in it. Skill challenges, specifically, are covered in very broad strokes, and you should be able to do quite a bit with that information.