Wow. That's just ouch.
First off, they choose the wrong fucking file type - if it's just text and it's on the web, html will do just fine and having a punch of those open won't strain the gaming lappy that I don't care if I spill mountain dew on.
Then it goes downhill starting at the special thanks.
Special thanks to Fredrick Svanberg, who inspired the idea of doing skill challenges in rounds, and to Keith Baker who gave me the idea of using partial victories
Special thanks to the designer for mentioning that he used secret houserules with the system he wrote in the first place?!?! Here I thought my siggy was pushing it, but I guess it's actually too subtle.
Player Options: While engaged in a skill challenge, players can use the following:
Bold Recovery: A player may spend an action point to reroll a skill check they have made, before they might know if the roll was a success or failure. The player must take the result of the reroll.
Er, and what's the order of operations here if I'm playing a Deva with Memory of a Thousand Lifetimes in a group where the ranger has Crucial Advice ? Might want to have clarified such things in advance.
In fact given that
Critical Success: A natural 20 on a skill check is an automatic success. In addition, the player gets one additional success.
I'm thinking players are going to be dumpster-diving for skill rerolls in any game that uses these rules, so establishing rules for
such interactions will became really important
A standard skill challenge is the same level as the party. Table 1 below gives the DC of a skill challenge at each level. If a DM wishes to change the difficulty, a +1/‐1 to DC changes the difficulty of the challenge by about +/‐ 10%.
Uh, I get that you're approximating there, but without knowing bonuses or even the number of characters rolling just how did you arrive at that figure?
Then they split challenges into Physical, Social or Mental, hilarity ensues:
Standard skills for a mental challenge include:
Arcana (Int) Dungeoneering (Wis) Heal (Wis)* History (Int) Insight (Wis) Nature (Wis) Perception (Wis) Religion (Int) Social (cha)** Streetwise (Cha)***
**Social skills can be useful to gain clues when other people are near the challenge site, such as using diplomacy to acquire help from the head librarian. Generally allow this only once per challenge per person.
Standard skills for a Physical Challenge include:
Acrobatics (Dex) Athletics (Str) Endurance (Con) Heal (Wis) Stealth (Dex) Thievery (Dex) Social (cha)* Knowledge (int or wis)**
*Social skills can sometimes be useful in physical challenges against other creatures. Using bluff to throw off a group of guards as you make your escape is a good example. Generally only allow this once per challenge per player.
Standard Skills for a social challenge include:
Bluff (cha) Diplomacy(cha) Insight (wis) Intimidate (cha) Streetwise (cha) Knowledges * (int or wis)
So the Cha character gets handed a one round pass in physical and mental challenges and the Int Cha gets a chance to weasel a useful skill in Physical and Social Challenges.
Good thing there are all those Str and End skills to use in Mental and Social challenges eh? And good thing the characters most likely to have those stats as primary have so many more trained skills? Oh wait, what's that - there's only on Str skill and one End skill? And fighters still get fewer skills than anybody else?
:sigh:
And as an additional nitpick, they aren't called "Knowledges" in 4e - the skills are Arcana, Dungeoneering, Nature and Religion, and each has a subuse that includes "Monster Knowledge" - but apparently you forgot that after writing the mental challenge list.
"But transportation issues are social-justice issues. The toll of bad transit policies and worse infrastructure—trains and buses that don’t run well and badly serve low-income neighborhoods, vehicular traffic that pollutes the environment and endangers the lives of cyclists and pedestrians—is borne disproportionately by black and brown communities."