Guidelines for Designing Non-Combat Challenges?

[Metaphysician]

So, the next adventure I run is going to center around an investigating challenge: the players have a certain amount of information, and they need to take this information and ferret out enough clues to determine. . . well, if not the truth, at least enough of the truth to point to the next major plot location. *ahem* To support this, I have a list of existing clues they have, as well as a list of relevant NPCs and organizations they can investigate. . . plus some enemy stats for if various encounters lead to a fight.

What I am having to improvise is how to actually rate the difficulty and XP for the overall scenario, since functionally, the whole scenario is one singular challenge "scene", just spread across multiple sites and interactions. The usual ways I use to approximate such don't *really* work for this. Its awkward to treat it like a non-combat encounter with a singular hostile NPC, because its so indirect. Its also not possible to treat it as a trap, because it does not and should not depend on a single pass/fail "either you succeed or you eat damage and lick your wounds, then continue" challenge. It also really shouldn't depend on a single dice roll in general.

Does anyone have any good tips or guidelines that they have used for established the framework of such an adventure?

[Pantshandshake]

Aside from 'use attendance or milestone based leveling?'

[Garretmander]

Do you know the amount of XP you want them to earn, or are you still trying to figure that out?

[Metaphysician]

I know pretty much exactly how much XP I want them to earn, yes. Also, I don't want to use milestone leveling because. . . ultimately, this is not about choosing the right amount of XP, primarily. Its about setting the challenge appropriately for the adventure. When I decide to throw a CR 6 combat encounter at the party, its first and foremost about wanting the party to face a certain amount of challenge at that point in the story. The same logic should apply for non-combat challenges, only their are fewer rules to properly benchmark them.

[Garretmander]

Metaphysician wrote:

I know pretty much exactly how much XP I want them to earn, yes. Also, I don't want to use milestone leveling because. . . ultimately, this is not about choosing the right amount of XP, primarily. Its about setting the challenge appropriately for the adventure. When I decide to throw a CR 6 combat encounter at the party, its first and foremost about wanting the party to face a certain amount of challenge at that point in the story. The same logic should apply for non-combat challenges, only their are fewer rules to properly benchmark them.

you mentioned finding clues and investigations. Break it up into chunks and assign them bit by bit to each clue and interaction or discovery. Based on success, partial success, or failure. Keep about 1/2 of it for a mission success reward.