Skill Challenge Proposal

[Incandescent]

As we have seen in many modules and published adventures, there is no real challenge in skill challenges. While the DMG2 does do some work to balance things more there is still one issue that I can't seem to find a way to balance with the rules as written:

DMs are to choose skills for the challenges that the party is trained in + Most checks to be made should be made against moderate DCs + characters trained in a skill with an anywhere near decent related attribute = Auto Win Skill Challenge

Now I can see how this works better in a combat situation where the party may not be able to bring the skill experts to bear exactly where they are needed. But in a non-combat situation every party member sticks to the skills they are good at, which are typically on par with or in excess of a moderate DC for their level, and there is no more challenge to the skill challenge (dice probably aren't even needed).

Now to make people have to roll to complete a skill challenge there are two ways I can see to do this:
1.) Make people use skills they aren't good at. Pro: challenge isn't free exp Con: you are punishing players for being good at stuff.  While i can see this working on occasion, it's not an every challenge kind of fix.
2.) Increase the DCs on the challenge. Pro: challenge isn't free and depending how much you are willing to adjust things you can better tune the challenge to the party Con: DM has to plan out their skill challenges in advance.  I'm thinking this is the best option as it's not like the DM isn't already planning the other encounters for the game anyway.

Doing a quick check on the M7-9 I found there were only 5 skills the party could not automatically pass at moderate DCs and nothing the party could not achieve with at worst a 75% chance of success (I'm kinda surprised no one knows heal).

What I'm thinking is for non-combat skill challenges doing a flat increase to DCs of 5 so that everyone would have to at least pick up a die during the challenges while at worst with the party off skill you guys can still pull it off with a 50% chance of success for a moderate DC.  If hard DCs were then required it would give the experts in the party a chance to shine as their superior training would actually mean something.

Let me know what you think of this tweak to the skill challenge system and if the other DMs think it may be something worth applying in their games to make skill challenges a more viable option.

[Fzoumah]

I think that as we gain levels, tweeking the skill challenge DCs sounds reasonable.  Between ability score increases, and the 1/2 your level modifier, things will get out of balance again eventually.  In other words, +5 to the DCs sounds fair, though you may have to do it again at some point in the future.

[wolfsrevenge]

The way it ends up working, the challenge always stays pretty much the same as your test (a normal DC is supposed to be 1/2 lvl + something that makes you have to roll a 1), so what Curt's saying is Can we roll a 6 to pass a Skill Challenge? Can we roll an 11 to pass a Hard challenge? Those with an extra few points in a skill will still need to roll a 3 or 4 to pass, but it's more of a challenge than right now...

[jtpattie]

sounds good. Um... either.

[thatdarncat]

I vote #2

Curt's nicer than I am, I've been tweaking DCs a bit for a while now. I just didn't tell anyone

[Seri]

Scott cheats but at least doesn't kill us with bridges and surround us with trees! I think it sounds okie

[jtpattie]

if you had not tried to kill them by pushing them off the bridge they would not have been morally offended and felt forced to do the same to you.