What skills are needed?

[shadzar]

PrC's initially appeared in the DMG

right, because they were supposed to be a DM tool, but as soon a a player metagamed while reading the DMG, they cried and moaned and WotC decided that there was money to be made by putting them into player products, so players would have more products to buy since games consist of more players than they do DMs so you dont want all the material to be for DMs which are a limited resource, you want products for the players who outnumber the DMs and thus have more money to spend.

why does THAC0 exist?

to get rid of the attack matrices in the DMG. duh, got a harder one?

Mechanical bonuses are bad

and now you are just being stupid again, and adding things that you think i said. so obviously the rest in this segment if useless to read.

This isn't using bonus in the same sense as "+2 bonus to hit." I read that as bonus in the sense of "free extra" or "helpful addition": something that isn't required but is desirable.

and yet, there isn't a single person that read that and played it as anything but mechanical. NWPs were used more than secondary skills. everyone else, used neither. NWPs were used specifically for mechanical bonuses, as they really add nothing else. a player can come up with ideas without having to be led down the right path or guided how to think with some list such as NWPs. and many did think for themselves rather than pick from a list.

so it was a bonus for those lacking in imagination? i still don't see that as viable for a game about imaginations, since that kind of player is lacking in one of the fundamental components needed to play. maybe imagination based games just arent for them, and that is ok. after reading a few more books or watching movies, or whatever inspires them, they will have a more developed imagination and be able to return without needing to be handheld to lead them to their own imaginations.

The three systems provide different ways to resolve arguments over what a character does and does not know.

no it doesn't it caused arguments more than resolves them. simply for reason i have laid out before on "fire-building".

Fire-building: A character with fire-building proficiency does not normally need a tinderbox to start a fire. Given some dry wood and small pieces of tinder, he can start a fire in 2d20 minutes. Flint and steel are not required. Wet wood, high winds, or other adverse conditions increase the time to 3d20, and a successful proficiency check must be rolled to start a fire.

Copyright 1999 TSR Inc.

all it does is gives times, not a reason for this specific "skill", and many times it would ahve people asking why it even existed and others couldnt start fires without tinderbox. you are talking about people that that live or die because of the life-giving element of fire. it is used for heating, cooking, etc... so how would they NOT know how to start a fire? why is every commoner and dirt farmer expected to afford luxuries such as tinderbox or flint and steel?

oh, but its for those "varying degrees" or extreme circumstances.. it adds 1 to 10 minutes to build a fire for this person IF a successful skill check is made.

WHO decides what adverse conditions are? the DM... instant argument from rules lawyers.

don't even get me started on how this is, to use a modern term, a "trap option", since it doesnt count for a wizard that could create a spark with a cantrip that would start a fire in less than 2-20 minutes, or a bigger spell in the event of winds, wetness, etc where the fire wouldn't really give a shit about those "adverse conditions" since he can violate physics anyway.

you may be falling into new-age thinking where being "rules not rulings" means everything is solved by the rules, but i am guessing you didnt live through the things so don't get them by not experiencing them. but it did the opposite of what you think it did. just the very gamist and arbitrary limit to NWPs since many would be common things peoples of a time in which games were had would know how to do.

this is why NWPs was just an add-on that had to be worked into your game and is entirely optional, and only WPs were required for tournaments to give pacing and a game clock to know how much game time passed when playing. not sure how that fits, but would have to check the RPGA handbook to see if game-time means anything special, when i remember the "vote" thing really being about was the game played any fun, and who was the best player at that table.

Codified skill systems have the advantage of making it clear what the character does and does not know up front.

this doesnt have anything to really do with NWPs specifically, but it falls flat when you realize that what you are saying would mean you can never gain new skills after you begin play. you might have meant "before you try an action at current you know what your options are", that might word it a bit better.

but as has been said, it cannot be all inclusive, therefore you cannot codify it, and it also loses that, WOW factor if you will. not to mention you really DONT know what you can do until you try, so what you think you know, or rather your character, means jack and shit.

now this is all based on systems that have existed, and i really dont think skill systems have a purpose, but would like to still try to devise one that does and see how it works!

Neither the characters nor the players know exactly what they will face, but they can prepare for what they expect to face.

the problem then lies in the fact that the player may come up with a good idea while playing, and not had any idea that "skill Y" could facilitate it because he had no need to come up with the idea prior and ask. so in the middle of an obstacle wherein some "skill" is need you have to retcon the game to correct a character sheet? do you even allow this or jsut screw over the player and the other players, because there is now no way to facilitate this workable idea because of some arbitrary number assigned to and from some "skill system"?

Player: Hey if we start a fire we can smoke the goblins out and kill them in an ambush!
DM: None of you took fire0building NWP, so you will not be able to get the fire going in this rain.



that is how it would work for those RAW or "rules over rulings" type of people as THAT is the way the system works right? good system? did it leave room for the DM to say yes or did the arbitrary limit of skill screw over a player due to bad design?

To a certain extent they existed in older editions of D&D as well, but widespread Internet access made it easier for people to discuss them.

not as much as you think. the Net-deck character came about BECAUSE of 3.x and the fact it had too much crap to fiddle with that made making the character more important than playing it. you cannot plan for everything unless you know exactly what you are going up against, and there is where metagaming comes into play. someone read the module before so knows how to do it with this new character? i could understand a revisit people would know things and if you are playing in away such that nothing has changed since you last left you only went to town for the purpose of being better prepared. but having read an adventure and picking only the things needed for it.. yeah that is "cheating", or worse... missing the point of an adventure game by trying to jsut BEAT it rather than play it.

Having the DM crap all over anyone who tries to "min/max" is a poor way to avoid flaws in the rules, and there is no reason a "min/maxed" character cannot have compelling characterization and a proper backstory.

the thing is, that is one of the things D&D was created to get away from. your miniature choices for wargames were minmaxxed, they had to be unless folliwng historical reeactments. you get to choose AS YOU PLAY, what you want to happen. Gary was conflicted with this holdover as can be seen in his mixed signals in 1e. whether he ever learned that this was the reason and he just couldnt find the way out of his mental rut because he had done such a thing for so long in wargames, i jsut ahve no idea, but God rest his soul, he damn well tried to get out of the rut in various places so that actions DURING play, were of more important than choices made BEFORE you played. i mean look at the BD&D character sheet. it has really nothing on it so that you are not bound by many things and can come up with new ideas at any time. now compare that to 3.x/4E character shets that are so cluttered with shit you are only pikcing from some lsit off the sheet rather than thinking during play. yeah the 2e sheet is cluttered to, but part of that is bad design in putting things for all those optinal rules you might choose to use and wasting space and crowding things for people that choose not to use them like NWPs, WPs, diety, etc.

The game has rules, the player knows the rules, and the player has stated an intention to choose a particular option given to him by the rules.

this is fine, but not how it works as you yourself should know that minmaxxers are CharOps-ers, and thus make "builds" which equate to:

It's fine to dump Strength because I'll have Gauntlets of Ogre Power by sixth level

which is as you say "metagaming".

ergo, minmaxxing/Char-Op-ing, is metagaming. and this probably the main reason i have not seen a decent skill system because it only encourages metagaming since every skill is associated with a mechanic to give a bonus. it jsut encourages metagaming and actually enforces it as the WAY to play. but you aren't playing at that point, you already beat the game before playing it. thus we end up in my signature "Play the game, not the rules."

is there ANY skill system that doesnt encourage metagaming that actually helps while during play as opposed to only limiting you to be stuck with choices you made before play? does the player get to play the game, or only his character? (which is almost the same concept of challenge the character not the player, because some people want to be challenged AS players as that is who they are, they only touch the game world through the character.)

i made that a parenthetical, but it really gets to the root of the problem i guess. players that like to play the game by playing it as opposed to trying to figure out how to beat if before play, want to be challenged as a player. they are the one playing the game, their character is not just a pawn in it, but their own simulacrum in the game. so they don't want to see the character challenged, THEY want to be the one making the decisions what happens when. so not having access to some sort of "skill" for a good idea because of some arbitrary limit made in order to "challenge the character" just ruins the game as the player's ideas and choices no longer matter.

something to think about as a different angle to the whole situation and MANY other things....

Regarding swimming in the desert, of course not all skills will be of equal use in all adventures or campaigns.

well that is why i asked people that play systems with heavy skill use to define what skills are needed, and why THEY as the player needs them. then we could gather ideas to see which ones would be most useful so things like that dont come up or as said before those "trap options" dont exist. but the thing just above seems more important right now as to the whole situation that just which skills, but what skills encourage and why. it is a conundrum.

[deaddmwalking]

this doesnt have anything to really do with NWPs specifically, but it falls flat when you realize that what you are saying would mean you can never gain new skills after you begin play. you might have meant "before you try an action at current you know what your options are", that might word it a bit better.

Having a skill system does not preclude gaining new skills as you continue to adventure.

but as has been said, it cannot be all inclusive, therefore you cannot codify it, and it also loses that, WOW factor if you will. not to mention you really DONT know what you can do until you try, so what you think you know, or rather your character, means jack and shit.

I don't think this necessarily follows. If a skill is defined as something that you can get better at with specialized training, you could always add additional skills as they become necessary. The fact that 3.x doesn't include a 'pilot' skill isn't a problem - if you have flying aircraft, you can just add it in. And if you don't think it's worth a skill, you make it a simple attribute check. Between those two options, you can pretty much handle anything.

the problem then lies in the fact that the player may come up with a good idea while playing, and not had any idea that "skill Y" could facilitate it because he had no need to come up with the idea prior and ask. so in the middle of an obstacle wherein some "skill" is need you have to retcon the game to correct a character sheet? do you even allow this or jsut screw over the player and the other players, because there is now no way to facilitate this workable idea because of some arbitrary number assigned to and from some "skill system"?

If a skill is defined as something you can get better at with specialized training, then not having a skill doesn't necessarily mean that you can't attempt something. Again, in a system like 3.x, most 'skills' can be attempted untrained. If you didn't think that swimming was going to be important and you find yourself drowning in a cistern in the desert kingdom, you can still attempt a check. If you were a 'good swimmer' (ie, possessed the specialized training that allows you to improve at swimming) you are almost guaranteed to be successful.

Having a skill determined in advance doesn't necessarily indicate you can't do something - but it does indicate that you can't suddenly claim to be the BEST at that thing - if you were you should have written it down on your character sheet and/or invested resources.

While your example below might be something that frequently happened in 2nd edition, it did not happen in 3.x:

Player: Hey if we start a fire we can smoke the goblins out and kill them in an ambush!
DM: None of you took fire0building NWP, so you will not be able to get the fire going in this rain.

i mean look at the BD&D character sheet. it has really nothing on it so that you are not bound by many things and can come up with new ideas at any time.

You mean, there is nothing to stop you from claiming to have always been an expert in Dwarven marriage customs the moment it becomes useful? But really, that just means you have to argue with the GM to convince him that it would be reasonable for you to possess the relevant skill at that moment. I've played 1st and 2nd edition and I've had the arguments about whether the CHARACTER would know how to make explosives and whether the GM would allow it or not.

This 'imagination arms race' can be desireable in some games, but it can also be a problem. In Cops and Robbers (or Cowboys and Indians) if I say 'I shot you' and you say 'but I have a bullet proof vest' then I can respond that 'I have armor piercing bullets', but you can counter that you 'have a magical forcefield that counters all bullets', then I counter that 'my bullets possess anti-magic properties'. Figuring out the rules in advance keeps these issues in check. Everybody knows what is 'reasonable' in these situations.

now compare that to 3.x/4E character shets that are so cluttered with shit you are only pikcing from some lsit off the sheet rather than thinking during play.

A 3.x player can attempt anything that a 1st edition character can attempt. They often also have specific abilities that influence those attempts. In 3.x, it is usually clear HOW GOOD someone is at a particular task; while in 1st edition it might be covered by an attribute check or Magic Tea Party.

ergo, minmaxxing/Char-Op-ing, is metagaming. and this probably the main reason i have not seen a decent skill system because it only encourages metagaming since every skill is associated with a mechanic to give a bonus. it jsut encourages metagaming and actually enforces it as the WAY to play. but you aren't playing at that point, you already beat the game before playing it. thus we end up in my signature "Play the game, not the rules."

Skills do not exist to grant a bonus. Skills exist to reflect differences in abilities between different characters. Choosing to be good at things is not metagaming. If I am a thief, I want to be able to open locks and pick pockets. These are useful skills for my chosen profession.

i made that a parenthetical, but it really gets to the root of the problem i guess. players that like to play the game by playing it as opposed to trying to figure out how to beat if before play, want to be challenged as a player.

I prefer to be challenged as a CHARACTER. You've accused me of winning at life by having friends and diamond-studded toilet paper. Interacting wiht the fictional world through the eyes of my character is interesting. My characters usually do things that I wouldn't do. I don't really care how good healing magic is, I don't think I'd enjoy being chewed on by a dragon. When I play a stupid character, I don't solve difficult mental puzzles that I, as a player, can solve. If I played as myself (no matter what was written on the character sheet), I agree - it wouldn't matter what's on the character sheet. But I don't want to play as myself. I want to play as a character that literally stabs gods in the face with a bit of pointy metal, or possesses god-like powers over reality. It is a fantasy game - and playing the character is part of the fun.

well that is why i asked people that play systems with heavy skill use to define what skills are needed, and why THEY as the player needs them. then we could gather ideas to see which ones would be most useful so things like that dont come up or as said before those "trap options" dont exist. but the thing just above seems more important right now as to the whole situation that just which skills, but what skills encourage and why. it is a conundrum.

You've insisted that your question is system neutral. That is a non-sensical position. The skills you include in the game should vary depending on the type of game. Excel is a skill that Employers often look for in a potential hire. If we're playing a game about jockeying for a promotion in a dysfunctional office, having Excel as a skill might make sense - but if we're playing in Hyboria, Excel is probably not an appropriate skill.

Because we're talking about a game, it's usually good to give people other options. For example, if you're bad with excel, but you're 'highly intelligent', you may be able to use the help function, online forums, and a reference book to succeed at an Excel skill check (though it may take you longer than someone trained). If something is unlikely to come up, it is usually better to express it as an attribute check - basically an untrained (+0) skill. If the skill is going to be used more frequently and characters will get better at it or pursue specialized training, you probably want to add it to your skills list.

Summary:
If a skill is defined as something you can get better at with specialized training, then not having a skill doesn't necessarily mean that you can't attempt something. If a skill is defined as something that you can get better at with specialized training, you could always add additional skills as they become necessary.

[codeGlaze]

Still trying to figure out why you return to beat the horse every now and then.

[deaddmwalking]

I would hate for someone like Shadzar to believe, even for a moment, that people are not responding because his evaluation is irrefutable. Since so many people have him on ignore, I feel compelled to respond - but only when I can stomach reading his poorly formatted posts. When I do read them, I often find something that makes the whole thing worthwhile. Like the one where he accused me of using diamond-studded toilet paper.

Maybe my perception of 'worthwhile' is a little odd.

[shadzar]

The fact that 3.x doesn't include a 'pilot' skill isn't a problem - if you have flying aircraft, you can just add it in. And if you don't think it's worth a skill, you make it a simple attribute check. Between those two options, you can pretty much handle anything.

again, cooking supper and will return time and storm permitting. if you can just have an ability check, why bother making a skill at all?

if you make your "pilot" skill later to add to the game, then what happens when a player says "but i would have taken that long ago if I knew we could have it then! can i change my X to pilot?"



and don't act like that wouldn't happen as has been show by one of the "K" posters in the MTP thread. players will want to retcon their character to minmax for this new skill if they think it is better than something they already have. this is jsut a disruption to the game as you are no longer plaiyng and must no basically create characters again.

therefore find the skills that would be MOST needed is my goal, and then worry about add-ons later. i just want to know what "skills" are needed and why?

[Kaelik]

if you make your "pilot" skill later to add to the game, then what happens when a player says "but i would have taken that long ago if I knew we could have it then! can i change my X to pilot?"

You let them take it. No one but you thinks that letting them modify their skills one time to account for a new rule is a big deal.

But you missed the point, if you think your game needs a pilot skill, you should add it before character generation. As a rule.

[deaddmwalking]

Jesus Christ, you're being dense!

The fact that 3.x doesn't include a 'pilot' skill isn't a problem - if you have flying aircraft, you can just add it in. And if you don't think it's worth a skill, you make it a simple attribute check. Between those two options, you can pretty much handle anything.

again, cooking supper and will return time and storm permitting. if you can just have an ability check, why bother making a skill at all?

Because... If a skill is defined as something you can get better at with specialized training, you want a way to represent getting better.

If an ability check (without modifier) represents doing something without specialized training, then you want to increase the check when someone has specialized training.

If you can't get better at something with practice, then you just make it an ability check. Breaking down doors falls into that category in 3.x. It doesn't matter how much you study, you don't get to put ranks into a 'break down doors' skill. It's a strength check, no matter what. Now, if you think that you SHOULD get better at breaking down doors with training or practice, you can make it a skill and give people a BONUS when they spend their time training or practicing.

Some things represent things you can train in to get better (usually called 'skills' in common English) and some things don't.

if you make your "pilot" skill later to add to the game, then what happens when a player says "but i would have taken that long ago if I knew we could have it then! can i change my X to pilot?"

This depends. If in my campaign my characters travelled from Fantasy World to WWI (as discussed in the Pathfinder sucks thread), they probably shouldn't be able to drop their training in jump to automatically have maximum training in 'pilot'. But there's no reason they can't practice or receive specialized training once they have access to aircraft, so there is no reason they couldn't DEVELOP the skill. Sort of how like I wasn't born knowing how to read or write, but I learned over time.

and don't act like that wouldn't happen as has been show by one of the "K" posters in the MTP thread. players will want to retcon their character to minmax for this new skill if they think it is better than something they already have. this is jsut a disruption to the game as you are no longer plaiyng and must no basically create characters again.

You usually advocate for not having a well-developed character background. If that's the case, then I don't know that someone WASN'T a pilot until the first time it comes up (other than what's written on the character sheet). If someone has ranks in 'swim' but has never actually gone swimming in the campaign and they COULD have had ranks in 'Pilot' (coming from a place that had flying aircraft) then absolutely, I'd let them switch the ranks over.

I want the players to have a character they're happy with. If they realize that their character concept is more 'pilot' and less 'swimmer', then as long as it doesn't have a major impact on the campaign, I'll roll with it. Now, if prior to this point the campaign was all about racking up as many Olympic Gold Medals in Swimming and the Michael Phelps character decides he wants to 'forget' how to swim and instantly master 'pilot' as a skill (which would invalidate most of the events of the campaign up to that point, I'd be more likely to object... But I'd probably let that player make a NEW character.

therefore find the skills that would be MOST needed is my goal, and then worry about add-ons later. i just want to know what "skills" are needed and why?

And THIS TOTALLY DEPENDS ON THE TYPE GAME YOU'RE MAKING.

If you're making a game about office workers, you'll want to include skills like 'computer use'. If you're making a game about knights competing in tournaments, you probably want to have something like 'horsemanship' as a skill. If you're making a game that covers the types of things that D&D (any edition) typically covers, you could start by reviewing the 3.x skill list.

The reason that's a good start is that most of the skills are things most people agree that you can get better at with practice or specialized training, and they're likely to come up in a large majority of games.

You could also look at some variations on that skill list, like Pathfinder's, which combines some skills (ie, Spot/Listen become Perception and Hide/Move Silently become Stealth).

You should choose a list of skills that you think people will likely want to become better at through practice or specialized training that are likely to come up in the game you expect to have. If someone puts ranks in a skill and it never comes up, there's no problem with letting them move those ranks around.

[Archmage]

You don't need skills, because you have a DM. Players tell the DM what they want to TRY to do. The DM decides whether it succeeds or asks for a die roll to provide the appearance of impartiality. You can TRY anything, but in practice if the DM thinks you should fail based on common-sense reasoning you will fail. If your DM is bad or you feel their decisions are insufficiently fair the only solution is to quit playing the game.

People who want more structure than this are dirty powergaming munchkins who only want rules so they can abuse them. Also, this wall candy is delicious and I'm not sharing.

</shadzar abridged>

[shadzar]

Because... If a skill is defined as something you can get better at with specialized training, you want a way to represent getting better.

and other than a mechanical bonus what does this really offer to a character? in ANY system where skills exist, what does this really offer? to the player? same thing, only a mechanical bonus to brag about to the other players, right? hey i have more ranks in "swim" than you do!

this is where it comes back to have and have not, or your terms trained and untrained. anyone can try, but the trained will likely be better.

same thing, he got better because he trained.

but then you hit the game and problems therein. there are arbitrary limits to the number of "skills" you can have.

fighter and barbarian are really just synonyms, yet they are each called classes. so leave out gamespeak such as that and speak english only, when explaining.

what do having these varying degrees do for the character IN THE GAME, or for the player?

where is it "balanced" in ANY existing system that uses skills? is there a system with NO limit to the skills so there is no arbitrary silliness, and then if so that no limit exists, why have a skill system if you can just do anything anyway?

If you can't get better at something with practice, then you just make it an ability check. Breaking down doors falls into that category in 3.x. It doesn't matter how much you study, you don't get to put ranks into a 'break down doors' skill. It's a strength check, no matter what. Now, if you think that you SHOULD get better at breaking down doors with training or practice, you can make it a skill and give people a BONUS when they spend their time training or practicing.

this i just have to laugh at, wait let me finish laughing.



so you call pre-3rd as those functions of an ability score a "skill" with which you could use? something like "Open Doors" would be a skill? funny EVERY character has that. but also funny when that isnt even needed for the case of breaking down a door because a door, even before DCs of 3.x had HP, and well 0 HP = no door.

i feel the "get better at" concept of skills comes from some new philosophy of gaming, where "get higher ability scores with levels" came from.

something wanted to be added to D&D, while it did not need it. so any other pre-WotC RPGs that had skill system that did something NOT interacting or using something like "ability scores"? or are they all kludges to the original D&D engine? and ANYTHING made by TSR was built off off D&D unless it was something like Snit's Revenge or other Tom Wham board games; including the Conan RPG.

i am still trying to figure out what the purpose of "gets better with training" is, when most game have removed the training requirement for leveling in the first place?

maybe if you go BACK TO the classes thread and try to differentiate the fighter and barbarian, and why both are needed as it asks, it will help me start to understand this "varying degrees" use in action from something i can see? must be some sort of training difference there right?

[JonSetanta]

Shadzar try shrinking the length of your posts/essays and I'll read them again rather than just skim.

[deaddmwalking]

Because... If a skill is defined as something you can get better at with specialized training, you want a way to represent getting better.

and other than a mechanical bonus what does this really offer to a character? in ANY system where skills exist, what does this really offer?

Wow. I totally missed the part where you missed the fact that different levels of skills is EMULATIVE. In real life, some people are very good at walking a tight rope, most people are not. Even particularly agile people usually cannot walk a tightrope without practice or specialized training. A skill lets you make some tasks EASY if you have practice or specialized training, without making it so easy that people without practice or specialized training succeed more often than our common sense would indicate.

to the player? same thing, only a mechanical bonus to brag about to the other players, right? hey i have more ranks in "swim" than you do!

Wow, you must play with some shitty people. I've never had a player brag about having more ranks in a skill than a comrade. As a player I've never done that. Now sometimes the party will divide a task based on who's most likely to succeed. For example, when faced with a difficult to climb cliff-face, rather than all free-climbing it, we send our best climber to attach ropes to the top, making the climb easier for everyone else. We like that people with practice or specialized training are more likely to succeed at difficult tasks - and because of that, as a team we're more likely to succeed.

Now, in the example that the 'bad climbers' are climbing the ropes (which is much easier than free climbing the cliff face) we may still need to know our relative climbing ability - for example, if we get attacked and someone tries to shake us off the rope... Or if that doesn't sound like it's covered by the climb skill, you could make it a Strength check - but then people will practice and specialized training will have no advantage on the check versus people that don't. If that's what you want, that's fine, but if you want people with practice or specialized training to do better at certain tasks (because it emulates reality) you might consider giving them a bonus to the task, or making the difficulty easier (which works out the same way).

this is where it comes back to have and have not, or your terms trained and untrained. anyone can try, but the trained will likely be better.

same thing, he got better because he trained.

Yes. This emulates reality. If you define a skill as something you can improve with practice or specialized training, we would expect people with practice or specialized training to succeed more often than someone without practice or specialized training.

but then you hit the game and problems therein. there are arbitrary limits to the number of "skills" you can have.

You're finally getting to a good point. Yes - in a game there are arbitrary limits to the number of skills you can have. In a D&D game, they're tied to levels. This means that if you are a 1st level peasant and you advance to 2nd level, you can gain a new skill (or skills). However, if you are a 2nd level peasant and you practice playing the piano everyday for 10 hours per day, you will NEVER master the piano unless you gain enough experience to gain another level.

Since HAVING SKILLS is emulative, you may want to have a different way of acquiring skills that is ALSO EMULATIVE. But from the perspective of the PCs who are going to be gaining levels, this is a minor quibble. From the perspective of the larger game world, you probably want to address ways to gain levels for classes that don't stick pointy metal objects into dragons.

fighter and barbarian are really just synonyms, yet they are each called classes. so leave out gamespeak such as that and speak english only, when explaining.

what do having these varying degrees do for the character IN THE GAME, or for the player?

You mean, why do Barbarians get more skills than Fighters in 3.5? Because of a bad rule. There are a bunch of them in 3.x. But you're trying to design a rule for skills that are system agnostic. There are lots of ways you can decide how many skills people get. Probably the number of skills should be roughly equal for everyone (perhaps modified by Intelligence if you consider that related to how quickly you can master a task) - again, if you're trying to be emulative. But because it is a game, sometimes emulation is sacrificed for playability or 'balance'. Rules that do this can be evaluated on how well they succeed at their intended goal.

Personally, the 3.x skills work pretty well if you give everyone at least 4 skill ranks at each level (but don't be afraid to give six) and you get rid of class/cross-class skills. For myself, it's still too fiddly - I don't really want to track the difference between a +12 and a +13 bonus on a skill, so I got rid of skill points entirely. In my game, you are either untrained (bonus equal to half your level + attribute), trained (bonus equal to half your level + attribute + 5), or expert (bonus equal to half your level + attribute +10). Some skills that require specialized training to even attempt have a flat penalty for people who are untrained.

where is it "balanced" in ANY existing system that uses skills? is there a system with NO limit to the skills so there is no arbitrary silliness, and then if so that no limit exists, why have a skill system if you can just do anything anyway?

I'm having trouble understanding you here, but if you are saying that if anything can be a skill, why have skills. You've made a terrible error in logic here. If anything could be a skill, and a character could have any skill why have skills? Because not every character can have EVERY skill. At least, not without the practice or specialized training required to advance the skill (which can totally vary depending on whatever hypothetical system you're using).

In 3.x, there are 36 'base' skills (not including variations like different Knowledge skills, and different instruments for Perform). There are a few more related to other systems (like Psionics) that creep in in different supplements. If you give 8 skill points per level, and you have an Int modifier of +5 (really the best you can get at 1st level using standard races and rules) you will get 13 skill points per level (except the x4 at 1st level). If you maximize your ranks in every skill you train in, you will be able to 'master' 13 skills - less than 1/3 of the total.

If you can't get better at something with practice, then you just make it an ability check. Breaking down doors falls into that category in 3.x. It doesn't matter how much you study, you don't get to put ranks into a 'break down doors' skill. It's a strength check, no matter what. Now, if you think that you SHOULD get better at breaking down doors with training or practice, you can make it a skill and give people a BONUS when they spend their time training or practicing.

this i just have to laugh at, wait let me finish laughing.



so you call pre-3rd as those functions of an ability score a "skill" with which you could use? something like "Open Doors" would be a skill? funny EVERY character has that. but also funny when that isnt even needed for the case of breaking down a door because a door, even before DCs of 3.x had HP, and well 0 HP = no door.

In 2nd edition, Open Door and Bend Bar/Lift Gate WERE NOT skills. They were ability checks. If you had a 10 in Strength, you were not as good at opening a door (using the Open Door check) then you were if you had a 20 Strength. You could not gain additional ability in opening doors with practice or specialized training. Since you cannot develop that ability with practice or specialized training, IT IS NOT A SKILL. If you define a skill as something you can improve with practice or specialized training, tautologically, only things you can improve with practice or specialized training are SKILLS.

i feel the "get better at" concept of skills comes from some new philosophy of gaming, where "get higher ability scores with levels" came from.

No. It comes from emulation of reality where people who practice and receive specialized training, master skills that are not available to the general population. The examples are myriad. Our educational system is designed to impart skills of reading, writing, mathematics, critical thinking and others. Piano lessons teach people to play an instrument. Doing mind-deadening tasks over and over and over again at work make us really good at pulling reports in Excel. Running D&D lets us develop our skills as a DM. If you've ever uttered the phrase 'practice makes perfect' then you know exactly where the 'get better at' concept of skills comes from.

something wanted to be added to D&D, while it did not need it. so any other pre-WotC RPGs that had skill system that did something NOT interacting or using something like "ability scores"? or are they all kludges to the original D&D engine? and ANYTHING made by TSR was built off off D&D unless it was something like Snit's Revenge or other Tom Wham board games; including the Conan RPG.

Sure. Your 'Pure' D&D never needed skills. But lots of people can't have the game experience they want without skills. I don't want a 'token' in a game - I want a character. Since real people have differing levels of skills and abilities, it is more emulative if CHARACTERS have differing levels of skills and abilities. Failure to include a skill system (in some form) makes it impossible to represent differing levels of skills and abilities. If you want to have games where differing levels of ability MATTER, you want to have a skill system.

For example - the movie Goonies has something of a well-known dungeon crawl. In the movie the characters had to successfully cross (Balance) a wet log over an underground river, they have to play a piece of written music on an organ without making too many mistakes (Perform). If you don't need or want situations like that in your game, you probably don't need skills. If you do want situations like that in your game, you probably do.

i am still trying to figure out what the purpose of "gets better with training" is, when most game have removed the training requirement for leveling in the first place?

I've tried to use the term 'practice or specialized training'. In 3.x style games, there is an assumption that you're getting better at the things that you do everyday. Rogues spend time sneaking, so when they level up, they put skill ranks in Hide/Move Silently; bards spend time playing their instrument, so when they level up, they put ranks in Perform. Some DMs do use training rules in some shape or form, but they're largely unnecessary. Someone taught themselves to play piano before there was someone to teach them. Developing a skill without a mentor may be more difficult than developing a skill with a mentor, but it can be done.

maybe if you go BACK TO the classes thread and try to differentiate the fighter and barbarian, and why both are needed as it asks, it will help me start to understand this "varying degrees" use in action from something i can see? must be some sort of training difference there right?

In regards to skills, there is no difference between a Fighter and a Barbarian that I can point you to. If 'barbarian' is a background meaning you come from a less urban environment, you'd expect barbarian characters to start with skills that are more closely associated with the natural world (like survival) while a knight might be more likely to study heraldry (Knowledge: Nobility). But 3.x is borked in that regard. Personally, in my game, we have BERSERKERs, not BARBARIANs. A Berserker can be from a civilized urban environment, or from a primitive 'barbarian' environment. But so can Fighters. And Rogues. And Wizards.

In my game, I can explain the difference between a Berserker and a Warrior (we don't actually use the name Fighter) - but none of the differences are related to skill access. Since skills are something anyone can learn with practice or specialized training, all skills are available to anyone to learn. In 3.x, it assumes that some characters are practicing such skills as part of their normal duties, so it comes to them more easily than others (more practice means more improvement). I find that too limiting for my games, but I can understand why they went that way.

In any case, if you want to EMULATE reality, where real people become better at a task if they practice or obtain specialized training, you probably want some type of skill system. If you don't want people to get better at a task with practice or specialized training, you don't want a skill system.

[Stinktopus]

Wow, you must play with some shitty people.

Dead, you are the closest thing to a friend that shadzar has. He doesn't play with anyone, and has admitted to such.

[shadzar]

Because... If a skill is defined as something you can get better at with specialized training, you want a way to represent getting better.

and other than a mechanical bonus what does this really offer to a character? in ANY system where skills exist, what does this really offer?

Wow. I totally missed the part where you missed the fact that different levels of skills is EMULATIVE. In real life, some people are very good at walking a tight rope, most people are not. Even particularly agile people usually cannot walk a tightrope without practice or specialized training. A skill lets you make some tasks EASY if you have practice or specialized training, without making it so easy that people without practice or specialized training succeed more often than our common sense would indicate.

and you miss the part where an RPG is not a perfect life simulation model.
was that one person on here or the WotC forums that was unhappy with D&D because it was NOT medieval England enough? they didnt want such abstract ideas about how a town would be, they wanted it to be historically accurate to how a king would act, how a kingdom would be structured, how society works.....

HEY, that is fine for their game, but problematic when you try to make a game that is a toolbox for all style of play conform to only one style, such as skills seem to be purposed for.

FANTASY, means different things to different people, and must be able to represent not only a single case or example. what you seem to want is too simulationist for the masses. well you can do that in your own game or find a life-simulation game for it, but it doesnt mean that it should exist in EVERY game played. You are free to add what you like to any game for your group, thus TOME material exists because 3.x is not a game system set in stone.

again it falls to the have and have-nots. it is a mechanical allowance, but not a mechanical bonus, or worse 100 mechanical bonuses.

"untrained" you just get a dice roll, "trained" maybe you get a flat bonus, but all the excess scaling and tweaking of a skill wastes time that could be used playing, and some people only want to know "can i walk a tight rope?" and then let the dice decide from there.

skills are just another christmas tree like magic items. i get it now. they only serve the purpose of tiny incremental bonuses to be collected and added together and serve NO real purpose in a game. my belief that they are not needed has been proven for ANY game. only players need "skills" to make them feel special. so i want play games that try to serve these "special needs" players. so i now have all the info i ever need on "skills" and the type of players that want them, both are useless.

[deaddmwalking]

what you seem to want is too simulationist for the masses. well you can do that in your own game or find a life-simulation game for it, but it doesnt mean that it should exist in EVERY game played.

Actually, the masses seem to like skills. But even if they're included in the game, you can just NOT UE THEM. Personally, I won't find that very exciting, since I think that some people should be legitimately better at climbing a mountain than others, and skills are an easier way to represent that then arguing with the DM about whether a Dwarf from a mountain kingdom is better at climbing than a human from the plains.

You are free to add what you like to any game for your group, thus TOME material exists because 3.x is not a game system set in stone.

It's usually easier to take things out of a game than to make things up from scratch.

skills ... serve NO real purpose in a game. my belief that they are not needed has been proven for ANY game.

It should come as no surprise to anyone reading that your idea of 'proof' is very weak. But yeah, if you don't want characters to get better at a task with practice or specialized training, skills aren't for you.

It might also be worth pointing out that you are advocating a paradoxical stance where people do not have defined skills but they may have said skill if they can convince the GM that they should - so you are effectively having skills, just not defining in advance what they are and how they apply.

[sandmann]

and you miss the part where an RPG is not a perfect life simulation model.

RPGs get to complicated with skills ? Really ??? Ever played Harnmaster or Rolemaster ? Dude, if you are to stupid to write down 10 numbers, thats your problem.

HEY, that is fine for their game, but problematic when you try to make a game that is a toolbox for all style of play conform to only one style, such as skills seem to be purposed for. (...) so i want play games that try to serve these "special needs" players. so i now have all the info i ever need on "skills" and the type of players that want them, both are useless.

"Hey, you can play every kind of game ... exept those I don't like, those are stupid."

"untrained" you just get a dice roll, "trained" maybe you get a flat bonus, but all the excess scaling and tweaking of a skill wastes time that could be used playing, and some people only want to know "can i walk a tight rope?" and then let the dice decide from there.

THATS EXACTLY WHAT SKILLS ARE FOR, YOU DUMBASS. That is the exact situation that ddmw has talked about. And that is exactly what you can NOT simulate without a skill system of any kind.

they only serve the purpose of tiny incremental bonuses to be collected and added together and serve NO real purpose in a game. my belief that they are not needed has been proven for ANY game.

No, you have proven shit. You have stated, and then ignored everything everyone has said to you.

So: Play without a skill system if you like, but stop torturing your brain with stuff you seem to be too dumb to understand. Or start listening and arguing.

[shadzar]

Where's your fantasy heartbreaker Shad?

since people are too stupid or too much into fighting some edition war, it is near impossible to finish one. one of the few places online where people have the balls to speak their mind, they sjtu regurgitate nonsense rather than talk about anything in a serious manner. the more important thing around these parts is working with modifiers for 3.x, rather than saying "Hey, what did Gary fuck up with D&D, and people keep repeating his fuck ups, and how do we fix them."

for all the shit they spew about it, they still lust after Gary and cannot say lets fix what he started going back to the earliest point, they only see some future fuck up that was build on one of his earlier fuck ups and run with it.

there is a point and time when you have to say that you REALLY fucked up and stop adding new fuck ups and go forward from the last working point.

sadly, the biggest fuck up to "player entitlement" and "balance" and "customization" to games like D&D, was the thief class, but nobody cn see that it stole the skills of functions of other classes for its own use when it didnt even need to exist.

we don't have Gary to ask who the thief was modeled on and WHY it follows the structure it does, but it is pretty clear to see Bilbo Baggins in it, so many it is time to go all the way back there and redesign forward without the thief to bring back what the game lost in 1975, the ability to play a better game with more diverse characters that were not so stuck in any one role from walking med-kit, to skill monkey, but ANY player could have their character try ANYTHING without some unneeded class hanging over head that is close, but not capable of doing what is wanted.

sorry this reply is so late, but this place only really discusses raping each other in every other thread, or how to get more +X out of some mechanic to brag about, not really about how to make ANY game work better for ANY real focus or point of the game.

so the clean i had been working on for 2nd has been scrapped since a rewrite is needed to remove the "thief" and the damage it has done to the game and RPGs.

It's usually easier to take things out of a game than to make things up from scratch.

take WBL out of 3.x and 4/E and see how well it works? what breaks when you remove them?

this is a case where a simple core, with add-ons comes into play. for those that do NOT need such things, they can avoid them. for those that want or need them, they have another purchase to make to get the extra they want.

then that simply means that "skills" are as always would have been a flavor addition, so they are not really tied to mechanics. what mechanics exist for them in their addition, would be something that must take the work and effort to apply to ALL the core of the game, say like 3.x "templates", 1/2 NWPs, etc.

and if you are playing a game of imagination and cant create things, you are probably playing the wrong game in the first place. there is little sympathy to give for trying to do something you admit you cannot do. YOUR imagination cannot be tought to you, you have to come up with it yourself.

and you miss the part where an RPG is not a perfect life simulation model.

RPGs get to complicated with skills ? Really ??? Ever played Harnmaster or Rolemaster ?

No, i dont play bad games.

[JonSetanta]

...it is near impossible to finish one.

Nope.jpg
I wrote one. It took a year to design with much input from friends but I did it.
No one here comments on it but that didn't deter me. Level 1 was playtested a few times and well enjoyed. It works... but it's not D&D, and therefore will never be accepted by internet denizens.
You are right though that members, and nerds on forums in general, would rather debate bonuses rather than attempt to correct the game.

[shadzar]

with much input from friends

ah, but there is the thing, you had people that were not so stuck into 3rd as if it was the greatest things since sliced bread, that they were receptive of other ideas. sadly, the ones i got started on D&D that have time still to play are interested in either a game that has characters making bracelets from the pubic hair of the goblins they slay and such immature stupidity, or they prefer to go to a bar and get slovenly drunk.

neither anyone worth bouncing any idea off of.

and the most funny thing about all the people that love all the math in 3rd, is because somehow AFTER 2000, they don't get THAC0, when they got it quite fine before, because like most of TGD and other forums, people just like to jump on a bandwagon of the popular thing to like and/or hate and follow whatever fad or trend is going around, rather than having an original thought.

like the people here, WorC forums, ENWorld, that cannot see that the thief is a downfall to D&D since it stole the skill from other classes, and the openness of classes to be able to do things that the game was made for, and went back to some wargame concept where you cannot do things outside of your class.

and with al the "math wanking" in things liek 3rd it is funny that people still cant figure out the player doesn't do THAC0, they only announce two numbers for the DM to figure:

I rolled 12 with a THAC0 of 15.

that is as simple as it is to use THAC0 from the player POV.

but people really don't get the point of the games as they have been brainwashed by gimmicks and video games like FFVII and such where the numbers and over-planning (character builds) have lost sight of the game itself and its purpose.

thus why i can't get a game written that gets back to the purpose because people like those on TGD and other forums are stuck in their ruts and with their heads up someone like Robin Law's ass trying to turn a simple game into a science and they just can't see the forest for the trees.

the intent for D&D was lost long ago and done so by Gary when he tried to remove Arneson from it. I would like to know what it could have been if cooler heads and smaller egos had prevailed. what came with 1st edition and everything after is jsut a bastardization of its reason for being created.

so IF only it stays in my mind and not in print and untested, there IS a very of the evolution of D&D rather than a mutation of it in the world, and in my head is where it will stay so long af the denizens of forums, the dredges that they are, are incapable of having a discussion about anything without being stupid and lacking in common sense.

most online forums are just ye olde schoolyard playground cliques, as pathetically true as that is.

[Voss]

and with al the "math wanking" in things liek 3rd it is funny that people still cant figure out the player doesn't do THAC0, they only announce two numbers for the DM to figure:

Because a lot of groups didn't play like that. I know I played with a large variety of people all over the country (and elsewhere) since I moved around so much, and almost universally, players worked the numbers out themselves and gave the DM the AC they hit. With new players, the other players helped them work it out, not the DM.

Shoving all the work onto the DM and just acting as a passive dice roller didn't appeal to many people.


But then, One True Wayism doesn't generally appeal either. Closing eyes and ears while humping a nonexistent Platonic Ideal gets one exactly nowhere.

[shadzar]

just because a lot of groups did it wrong/the hard way, doesnt mean anything.

"shoving all the work", have you never heard the phrase that "DMing is a labor of love"?

it also goes to show how confused people are to rehash the old bit that players NEEDED the AC... when they really didn't. i am sure it was more player choice to want to do it that way than DM choice, because a DM wouldnt mind either way, as it is one number and just needs comparing to another number.

yes the ONETRUEWAYism of the sacred cows is a problem, one that i have for years tried to get rid of like the thief and skills.

in the time of people originally playing and making D&D and with adverts along the lines of "you get to act out your own stories and adventures instead of just seeing what James Bond or Captain Nemo does, but get to decide for yourself what you would do..." the game being about being MacQuyver (yes even before MacGuyver) was what people wanted and what it was created for, not to play out War Games (pun intended), when you just had to pick the right options from the only available options which in the end is to play Tic-Tac-Toe, by selecting it from the proper menu such as new gaming ideals/styles/philosophies hold to.

[Leress]

thus why i can't get a game written that gets back to the purpose because people like those on TGD and other forums are stuck in their ruts and with their heads up someone like Robin Law's ass trying to turn a simple game into a science and they just can't see the forest for the trees.

No one is stopping you from making the game that you describe.

------------------

What do you want from an RPG, Shad? This "someone explains what they think and you tell them they are wrong" isn't getting anywhere. What are your design goals? The best I can gather so far is this:

1. 3 archetypes :Wizard, Cleric, Fighter
2. A skill system without arbitrary limits on the number of ones one can have.

[shadzar]

What do you want from an RPG, Shad?

did you not read? i want to see what would have happened had the thief not stolen the abilities from everyone else to become some necessary device. had the game gone right instead of left, what would it have looked like.

would there really be that much bloat if you didnt have to make 564164 classes and the abilities continued to be something anyone could easily do?

i want the PC whose stats can fit on an index card, but his options couldn't fit in the Library of Congress.

once Tolkien is removed, and had the war of Greyhawk and Blackmoor never occurred to necessitate AD&D (BY GARY GAGYX), what would the game have looked like.

basically like asking if the spanish hadnt invaded would the Aztecs have still been around today?

then for those over-simulationists, what could be added to the simplicity of that system to give them their oddities, while allowing the simple to be played by those that want it.

i guess you could say, OD&D 2.0 with some of the things from today, but the simplicity of OD&D without all the foibles and snahus of feats and WBL and such. obviously still needs to remove CHAINMAIL from it so it is a whole game itself, without going the BD&D route of having thief or elf as a class....

cant really say for sure, since many people don't understand the concept of a character on an index card they are too caught up in needing $5000 worth of books sold to them at 44% markup just to be able to use anything or do anything in a game, or to go the opposite way of playing the telephone game or MAD LIBS, or something like that.

[Voss]

What do you want from an RPG, Shad?

Apparently a time machine, a gun and unreasonable expectations of a single man. I hope you weren't expecting a sane answer.

[CCarter]

@shadzar: Ever checked out Tunnels and Trolls?
It was the earliest ever D&D ripoff, made about 1977. Its in about its 7th edition currently (with a Deluxe on the way). Its basically designed to have minimal rules; in the 7th edition they added skills rules but until then it was just stats and classes. Often uses player skill (sometimes with an attribute 'saving roll' to resolve things, for instance finding traps is usually by describing how you find the trap. It used to be possible to download a free core rules off drivethrurpg.

[Kaelik]

@shadzar: Ever checked out Tunnels and Trolls?
It was the earliest ever D&D ripoff, made about 1977. Its in about its 7th edition currently (with a Deluxe on the way). Its basically designed to have minimal rules; in the 7th edition they added skills rules but until then it was just stats and classes. Often uses player skill (sometimes with an attribute 'saving roll' to resolve things, for instance finding traps is usually by describing how you find the trap. It used to be possible to download a free core rules off drivethrurpg.

But all the versions of Tunnels and Trolls besides Second Edition are not the real Tunnels and Trolls because...