What skills are needed?

[shadzar]

What skills does an RPG need, and why for each skill?

Skill (n): any function that can be done by a PC, be it based on class, race, or player needs.

[angelfromanotherpin]

Varies wildly. An RPG based on The West Wing is going to have very different requirements of its skill system than one based on Rawhide.

[shadzar]

not really. do either need rules for human character to walk? is there an RNG required to take a step?

common sense.. use it. i know this is not something many people on TGD appear to have, but making they could learn it?

so someone start naming them from RPGs, any genre. it won't make a universal skill system, but give people ideas of what skills people look for in a game for certain classes, certain races, or just from certain people.

[Leress]

not really. do either need rules for human character to walk? is there an RNG required to take a step?

common sense.. use it. i know this is not something many people on TGD appear to have, but making they could learn it?

so someone start naming them from RPGs, any genre. it won't make a universal skill system, but give people ideas of what skills people look for in a game for certain classes, certain races, or just from certain people.

You start.

[Lago PARANOIA]

common sense.. use it. i know this is not something many people on TGD appear to have, but making they could learn it?

so someone start naming them from RPGs, any genre.

ゲームのルールの作り方は分りませんよ　:nuts: I can't making could learn common sense.　

Anyone know what this dude is talking about?

[Zaranthan]

Munchhausen doesn't have any skills, so therefore zero skills are necessary to have an RPG. You're welcome.

[zugschef]

Munchhausen doesn't have any skills, so therefore zero skills are necessary to have an RPG. You're welcome.

This. Five year olds can play MTP and there aren't any skills.

[fectin]

In a (likely misguided) attempt at drive-by salvaging, how about this: what broad categories of actions should most RPGs model? I'm not sure there's value here, but we might get a nice ontology.

Offhand, I see physical and social combat, observing the setting, and creating setting elements (craft, magic item creation, etc).

[deaddmwalking]

not really. do either need rules for human character to walk? is there an RNG required to take a step?

In D&D, you frequently have to make a 'Dex check' to walk on a difficult surface, like grease or ice. Under normal circumstances, these aren't considered 'skills' because once you learn how to walk, you're considered 'proficient'. There are no 'expert walkers'. Skills don't work like breathing or walking where it only matters whether you have attained at least basic proficiency (outside of unusual circumstances like difficult surfaces or being underwater).

common sense.. use it. i know this is not s
omething many people on TGD appear to have, but making they could learn it?

My common sense tells me that forging a piece of iron into a horseshoe is harder than it looks. Crafting a sword is even harder. Including gold inlay and etching is even harder. Crafts aren't easy, and not everyone is equally proficient. Some people are simple apprentices, some are skilled journeymen - others are masters. You may not think that adventurers need the ability to make horseshoes or forge weapons, but if your system includes it, having a 'skill' system that differentiates between 'beginners' and 'masters' is useful.

Outside of craft type skills, anything you think someone should be able to improve through training is often best represented by a skill system. Some 'skills' are baked into class progression (like attack rolls - a Fighter can't choose NOT to get better at stabbing people when he gains a level) but others are more 'optional'. A Fighter might practice 'swimming' but might not practicing 'blacksmithing'. Since whatever skills he practices in will usually see some level of improvement, a skill system can represent that beyond what a simple attribute check can do.

[RobbyPants]

not really. do either need rules for human character to walk? is there an RNG required to take a step?

common sense.. use it. i know this is not something many people on TGD appear to have, but making they could learn it?

so someone start naming them from RPGs, any genre. it won't make a universal skill system, but give people ideas of what skills people look for in a game for certain classes, certain races, or just from certain people.

You start.

God dammit, I wish I could put him on double ignore. Every time someone quotes a gem like this, it makes my eyes burn.

[JonSetanta]

A social skill or series of skills, but I prefer just one

A perception skill

An athletics skill and/or acrobatics skill, some kind of physical motion

A swimming skill split apart from athletics

A craft skill

[nockermensch]

Right, to make this thread useful:

Which skills are needed for a game with D&D's scope? Which ones should be "skills" (everybody can take them), and which ones should be "class features"?

[...You Lost Me]

Right, to make this thread useful:

Which skills are needed for a game with D&D's scope? Which ones should be "skills" (everybody can take them), and which ones should be "class features"?

I think "skills" should be stuff like craft, perform, and other fluffy things. Skills that are useful and honestly shouldn't fail like spellcraft and ride should just be select-able class features. Then things that everyone should be able to do like concentration and hide should be just level-based, with class features to improve them.

Of course, actually dividing those appropriately takes effort and more thought.

[shadzar]

^"have" and "have-nots" seems a very easy to use way for many thngs like "ride" where there are common "skills" shared whether it be one quadruped or another. not sure what you mean by "concentration" so you will have to elaborate on that one, as i am guessing it is from Shadowrun or 3.x? literally sounds like a 3.x feat if i were guessing about it.

In D&D, you frequently have to make a 'Dex check' to walk on a difficult surface,

so you think skill for swimming, breathing in other environments, and nimbleness should exist so that people can do these things in varying degrees from newborn levels to tightrope walking over the Grand Canyon. ok.

My common sense tells me that forging a piece of iron into a horseshoe is harder than it looks.

crafting, now here is a sticky wicket. just what type of things in an RPG do you need crafting for? Craft(Baskets) [Profession(Basket-weaving)]

does this need to really exist? how many skills would be better of to be grouped together as maybe that "profession" concept so that, if one does it with their profession, then can relatively well do it outside of it say Profession(Furniture-making)? now in medieval this could be carpentry and making a chair is no different than making a gallows in more modern, tho many of the same skills are required, it would only allow furniture making knowledge since there are "rules" for making houses that you must conform to.

in both, using hammers and nails and planes and saw would probably be available skills. so would you need those types of skills like "swimming" for those corner cases when a furniture-maker might be able to come up with something like say a trapped desk? making a hidden compartment in a desk drawer for any use a furniture maker should have common knowledge to do, so then being able to untrap it wouldn't be too hard, or at least to tell it has a hidden compartment. so anyone with (furniture-making) can detect certain trap as well remove them and not have to be a special "class" like "burglar" or its kin to remove a trap.

so this opens up a lot of possibilities right? at least frees up some space to not have to narrow one type of activity to a specific person as THEIR "role" in the game.

not having too specific a set of "professions" unless you game is a mercantile based one, then you don't have to add a bunch or details about them and just go with it as common sense.

a Fighter can't choose NOT to get better at stabbing people when he gains a level

why, or rather why not?

1E AD&D had rules for training, that was lost say in 2nd; so that you had to actually train when gaining a level. well you didn't gain the level until you DID train, so there was no "ding" moment.

maybe this just means this "attack roll" should not be tied to level, but a trained skill? part of it is luck, just like anything with an RNG, and you cannot train that. you could choose to train something else instead. those training harder get more, and training less, don't get the more.

examining the "attack roll" accuracy is a part of them, this goes for stabbing items like a knife, as well as an arrow shot from a bow. you hit more often is you are more skilled with using a bow. does ability to use a bow, convey to stabbing someone with a knife in terms of accuracy? does learning to stab better by being more accurate with a knife, convey better shots with a bow?

i say you CAN choose NOT to get better at stabbing when you level as a "fighter" depending on the system you have designed. does a laspistol target practice training convey better knife stabbing accuracy? in no genre can i see your statement true unless "stabbing" is the only skill and you still have levels which raise skills.

so maybe this "attack roll" is flawed, but that is another thread entirely.

so you have listed some acrobatics and survival skills, manufacturing skills, and fighting skills to be specific. it is a start.

[shadzar]

Right, to make this thread useful:

Which skills are needed for a game with D&D's scope? Which ones should be "skills" (everybody can take them), and which ones should be "class features"?

actually that doesnt help, as systems are often used for more than one genre.

AD&D system was based on Boot Hill, that was adapted from OD&D and a kludge of something else, which i have forgotten.

d20 was not only a system for medieval, but was used for D&D a medieval/past/fantasy/S&S game, as well "Modern" and "Future" genres.

so you really must understand what skills do for the game, before you can assign them to any one game or genre. that is what this thread is is doing.

@sigma: adding social skills to the list, but what? what should they do, where should the be used?

DDMW mentioned DEX checks, which would be what NWPs used for the acrobatic style "skills" of AD&D. do you just mean INT/WIS/CHA checks like those for diplomatic situations, or something else like its own system aside form a common "skills" system?

[deaddmwalking]

I have trouble understanding what you're trying to say.

I provided an example where an attribute check is useful INSTEAD of a trained skill. Walking doesn't require a 'skill' because it isn't something that has very clear differences in level of proficiency. In situations where it MIGHT matter, most people can succed with an 'untrained' attribute check. But since you bring up tight-rope walkers, it is clear that something like 'balance' can be trained beyond 'normal' levels. Assuming I can become a great tight-rope walker without becoming any more Agile/Dextrous, that would be an example of a 'trainable skill'.

Anything you want players (or NPCs) to learn to do BETTER than 'average' may be well represented with a skill. Some skills could certainly be represented without differerent levels of mastery (like for most purposes, in D&D we have one level of 'fluency' in language).

If you excise trainable skills and make them class features, you won't have low-level experts that are master craftspeople. Only high-level adventurers will forge swords.

In any case, my favored use of skills involves three levels of training: untrained (bonus equal to 1/2 level + attribute modifier), trained (as untrained +5), and expert (as untrained +10). I don't care for the fiddly skill point tracking or the difference between a +2 and a +3 in a skill.

With this system, it is possible for a high level character with no 'special training' to be better than a low level character with training, but they'd be unlikely to be 'better than an expert'. And in case it matters, I don't go up to level 20.

[JonSetanta]

@sigma: adding social skills to the list, but what? what should they do, where should the be used?

I'm no expert on this but I did a lot of reading when I tried to design my own mechanics for it.

The best use IMO for a social skill is:
1. When PCs first meet NPCs. The initial reaction roll.
2. When PCs attempt to adjust a hostile or neutral NPC reaction for the better.

[shadzar]

^ you were too fast. so you want some kind of system that incorporates meetings/greetings first, then from there maybe something more.

so when the troll wanders into a human town, per say, then you dont just go into troll-killing mode, there is a chance for the humans to be receptive because your system allows for that...unless you just want insta-troll death by humans.

so what to call that? "hostility" has been used, "factions"... it can be named later, but it is a good idea for something needed. not sure it fits with this idea of skills, but maybe can broaden the term. i will think how, but it is a good idea for SOMETHING that would work in games.

In any case, my favored use of skills involves three levels of training: untrained (bonus equal to 1/2 level + attribute modifier), trained (as untrained +5), and expert (as untrained +10). I don't care for the fiddly skill point tracking or the difference between a +2 and a +3 in a skill.

this may be the reason you are having trouble understanding. you are trying to apply an existing system onto an idea and basic concept.

i am not talking about any developed system in either thread you are walking into. you keep assuming a system of this or that with them be it "skills" or "classes". you need to throw that out and focus on the singular part being discussed.

this is why i took your DEX check example and made it a basic idea of acrobatics type skills and such because nobody said DEX would be there to use. to develop a system you have to know what you are developing it for, not just patch some new-fangled system onto something that already exists. then you can develop something that works, rather than now have two broken things trying to work together.

you are trying to apply and assume a new system concept and design concept into the existing d20 system, which is not the point or purpose of either "skills" or "classes" as they existed prior to the "d20 system".

so climb out of the d20 box, and think generally. not chastising you, just observing your continued confusion because of how you apply an existing system to an undeveloped idea. it isn't bad to parse from things you know, but you cant stop there, you have to view the whole picture.

skills in general such as "acrobatics" type things. that is what is being looked for in this thread, not how to make them work for X system, because the game system doesn't exist, so they can work ANY WAY someone comes up with later, using this thread to gleam ideas from for designing a working system for "skills". this way you dont kludge everything into rolling a d20 and wonder why all the little subsystems dont work at all. you can develop the subsytems then figure out how to make them work together, or in many cases realize that they aren't even something that SHOULD work together or the same way.

combat = attack roll : true
diplomacy = attack roll : WTF!
tightrope-walking = attack roll : ok seriously, WTF, stahp eet!

two of those might work together in some way, some times, but not always ALL the time, while "diplomacy" would stand alone as either you are doing it as a skill, or you now have combat. you wouldnt merge the systems, you jsut leave one and entire the other when that time comes. but again, neither a "skill" system exists, nor a "combat" system to really discuss and apply particulars to such as "modifiers", etc.

that is why they should be discussed to see what type of system should be created for them. (same with the classes thread, which nobody wants classes since nobody would come up with anything, but people LOVE skills so here we are.)

[deaddmwalking]

this may be the reason you are having trouble understanding. you are trying to apply an existing system onto an idea and basic concept.

i am not talking about any developed system in either thread you are walking into. you keep assuming a system of this or that with them be it "skills" or "classes". you need to throw that out and focus on the singular part being discussed.

Munchhausen doesn't have any skills, so therefore zero skills are necessary to have an RPG. You're welcome.

[Grek]

Just pointing this out now: shadzar is not interested in an honest or reasonable debate about skill systems in RPGs. He does not think that skill systems are necessary and will not accept an answer which involves having numerical skills. This thread exists to catch people in a "gotcha" about how skill systems are unnecessary and therefore we should all revert back to the specific version of 2e D&D's NWP system that shadzar remember using in his youth.

[Voss]

What skills does an RPG need, and why for each skill?

Skill (n): any function that can be done by a PC, be it based on class, race, or player needs.

This... doesn't work. 'Any function' can cover literally anything, from breathing or even fucking cell division to 'build cathedral' or understand physics.

The basic problem is open ended design is a bad way to approach things. What are the goals? What sort of system is the skill subsystem going to live inside?

[erik]

I don't see how you can have a functional RPG without a cornholing skill.

[ishy]

As long as you don't have any basket burning skill, seen quite enough of that.

[shadzar]

I don't see how you can have a functional RPG without a cornholing skill.

"pipe-making" would fall under some sort of crafting.... then you can have your "corncob pipe" just like Popeye has. (or in your case i guess it would be Popeye's never mentioned cousin Browneye.)

[shadzar]

so in all the huff and puff made arounbd here, nobody actually has a single skill they can define as needed?

and THIS is the forum of wannabe designers, but they have absolutely no ideas on anything? not on skills, not on classes...on nothing at all.

interesting.