Idea: Consolidating Skills

[Draco_Argentum]

Why?

Why not? The bit where some people get to have skills and some don't is dumb. The bit where talking to people is something only some characters can be good at is stupid too.

We already know every character has to be viable outside combat. They all need the same number of skills.

Getting rid of class skill lists helps that by getting rid of the stupid fighter syndrome. Now you could still keep some skills limited by class but I think its not really necessary.

[Leress]

In 3.5 D&D, some skills are more valuable than others, so I decided to combine some of them.

Craft and Know (Architecture & Engineering) are now Craft.

All Craft sub-skills are put into Craft.

Knowledge (Nature, Geography, and Dungeoneering) become Know (The land).

Knowledge (History, Nobility and Royalty, Local) become Know (People and Governments).

Knowledge (Arcana & The Planes) become Know (Arcana).

Know (Religion) remains the same.

Listen and Spot become Notice.

Hide and Move Silently become Stealth.

If one class has one skill (ex. Arcana), they gain said applicable skill as a class skill, and can use the other functions of said skill (ex. a Sorcerer can use THe Planes function of Arcana).

Cross-class skills are bought on a 1-1 skill point basis. The maximum ranks still remain the same, but rounded down (ex. 11 instead of 11.5 at level 20).

What do you guys think?

What about Survival, Heal, Disable Device, UMD, and Open Lock?

[Jerry]

What about Survival, Heal, Disable Device, UMD, and Open Lock?

I decided to ditch the system (except for the Notice/Stealth part); however, I think that Know (Archit. & Eng.) should be combined with Disable Device and Open Lock. Those three skills should be called Engineer or something.

As to Bigode pointing out my comparison, I agree with him, especially with the "special attention" part. How often is Craft (Leatherworking) going to come up, say, to Listen and Spot?

[Calibron]

Link because it's relevant and I love to promote myself.

[Jerry]

Thanks, Caliborn! I'll look it over.