Community

I second this. I've run a couple and sometimes they work (as in, is fun) and sometimes they don't work and I can't seem to distill what separates a good skill challenge from a bad one.

I don't think I have any recorded examples of skill challenges. There are a few play-by-post examples in the 4e Skill Challenges group (community.wizards.com/skill_challenges_4...) but otherwise that group is basically defunct.

The reason I love skill challenges is because they showed that there was a way to address the issues that have historically come up with non-combat parts of the game. This way doesn't cover everything, and not all aspects of that way need to be (or can easily be) applied to every non-combat challenge, but if nothing else, it's good to have some sort of a fallback.

What I tell experienced DMs is that skill challenges are no different from what they've always done, it's just that now they have some backing in the rules. Those rules don't advise anything that we couldn't or should have always been doing. So, as a default, don't do anything different than you've always done. If you want to use skill challenges, start by adopting the aspects of the rules that solve any problems you had with the old way - and if you had no problem with the old way, just continue using that.

For me, these are the key aspects of skill challenges. They only one I don't consider to be optional is the first one:

1. Failure must be interesting: I never got this, in all the many years and editions and games I've played, but it's obvious now, and it's key. If you're making an extended challenge out of something, don't make the ending fall flat, or be a dead end. Don't just expend resources. Make the ending something that the PCs can pick themselves up from and move on with. Make it an interesting complication. If you do this, then pretty much nothing can go badly wrong with your skill challenge. If you can't see a way to do this, consider not making it a challenge at all, because it won't be to anyone's benefit for the PCs to fail it. (Incidentally, this applies to combat as well as non-combat, but I won't harp on this here.)

2. Neither failure nor success can be short circuited: It's classic to have a delicate negotiation, or infiltration spoiled by a single roll. It's classic to have a seemingly impossible task knocked out by a natural 20. It can also be aggravating. If you enjoy those kinds of scenes, keep them, but skill challenges mean you don't have to. Have some fun describing the results of the die, but the challenge continues. The required successes or failures allow the scene to develop at least a little, allowing for some back-and-forth, and also some involvement by multiple characters.

3. Some skills always work, some not always: There are no "possible" skills. The "primary" skills are just the skills that definitely apply to the challenge. Any other skills (what were originally called "secondary" skills) might also apply if they seem plausible, but the DM should not feel compelled to give a success or failure or anything else for those rolls. The way the skill is making the challenge less complicated (i.e. granting successes or bonuses or positives) or more complicated (i.e. granting failures or penalties or negatives) needs to be clear. Try thinking about actions, rather than skills. How can this action make things better or worse and what's the applicable check to make.

3a: Some skills never work, or work but don't directly help: Some skills can be locked out. This gets over used, as with Intimidate in negotiations (because people don't seem to get what "intimidate" can mean). Use it sparingly, and to shake things up. Other times, the challenge isn't "about" the skills you'd expect it to be. Yes, you need to negotiate with someone, but that's the easy part and the hard part is weaving through the social scene, or something.

4. Use a DC that makes sense with your description: Don't use a DC just because it's appropriate to their level. Use the DC you think is appropriate to your description. If you want to use a DC appropriate to their level, try to distinguish your description of it in some way from the description you'd use for a higher or lower DC. If, in describing it, the challenge seems like it should be trivial or impossible for the party, then consider not making the scene a challenge.

5. Use them like monsters: This, to me, is what the codified XP for skill challenges means: that they can and should be linked up with each other and with combat. This realization is what made skill challenges really click for me. They often don't make very much sense when they're just by themselves. And they don't really make sense when lots of skills are shoehorned into give everyone something to do. Better just to have other things going on.

There are lots of ways for a skill challenge to go bad, and anyone who has played older editions has seen them before skill challenges were even invented: lame description, blocking for no good reason, a challenge that the DM either won't let succeed or won't let fail, players doing weird things or not clear on what to do, players afraid to make things worse. Some of these the mechanics can help with, some they can't.

That's enough for now. I'm happy to discuss more and might even be able to be convinced to run an example challenge at some point.