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View Full Version : Rewriting Reality Part 4: Using Skills



Ziegander
2013-05-10, 10:08 AM
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http://mygirlfriendisadm.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/reynolds00.jpg?w=640&h=392&crop=1
Image credit: Wayne Reynolds, ©Wizards of the Coast

d20 Reality. Where Fantasy is what you make it.

Projectlog (links):

Thread #1 (The Basics). (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=278249)
Thread #2 (The Abilities). (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=279120)
Thread #3 (The Chassis). (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=281167)


Changelog (as of Part 3):


The core mechanic is left unchanged, but automatic success/failure is more uniformly used by all d20 rolls. Degrees of success/failure will also be used throughout the system for less binary results.
Modifiers are being reduced (for the time being) to Circumstance, Competence, Enhancement, Inherent, and Item.
Ability modifiers cap at +5 though "superpowers" can be accessed by scores that would normally have a higher modifier. This helps keep the RNG reigned in tight.
The Strength score modifies physical damage rolls and save DCs, encumbrance, and climb, jump, and swim.
The Agility score modifies defense and balance, escape artist, hide, move silently, and tumble.
The Dexterity score modifies all attack rolls and disable device, open lock, sleight of hand, and use rope.
The Intelligence score modifies skill points per level and arcana, architecture & engineering, decipher script, history, religion, search, and speak language.
Wisdom is replaced by Cunning which modifies initiative, dungeoneering, listen, nature, sense motive, spot, and wild empathy.
The Charisma score modifies magic damage rolls and save DCs, and bluff, diplomacy, disguise, handle animal, perform, and ride.
Reflex saves are a thing of the past. They are merely attack vs defense. An area effect deals half damage on a missed attack. Other things previously a Reflex save, such as catching one's self to avoid a fall, are merely Agility checks.
Constitution and Willpower represent two derived scores. Constitution derived as the average of the three physical ability scores (Str, Agl, and Dex) while Willpower as the average of the three mental ability scores (Int, Cng, and Cha).
Constitution modifies hit points and damage reduction. Poisons and other such things offer a character the chance for a Constitution check to reduce their effects (or negate them entirely).
Willpower modifies mind points useful for mitigating mental manipulation and debilitating stress but also as a resource for magic-based powers. Charms, Illusions, and many others offer a character the chance for a Willpower check to reduce or negate their effects.
Base Attack Bonus and Base Save Bonus no longer exist. Instead, as part of the character level Chassis, characters receive +1 to all d20 rolls (and to Defense) per two character levels.
Skill (Proficiency) Ranks are no longer one/level (or one/two levels for cross-class), but rather there are five ranks Novice (1-4), Expert (5-8), Master (9-12), Paragon (13-16), and Legend (17-20). Each rank costs 1 skill point (or 2 for cross-class skills) and grants a +2 bonus to d20 rolls relevant to the Skill. Beyond these ranks and their vertical advancement, skill points may be spent to purchase horizontal advancement in the form of Skill Tricks which can include even things such as maneuvers and spells.



Skills in the d20 game represent things that creatures can do, or at least attempt to do, within the confines of the game world. Climbing, Jumping, even Using Magic Devices comes down to training in specific skills. Easy tasks can often be performed by characters with little or even no training in the skill in question, but the most difficult tasks, those with the highest DC (or Difficulty Class), can only be performed by those with the best training. Or rather, those with the biggest modifier.

One of the biggest failings of d20s basic Skill system is that the ranks themselves are almost meaningless and the bonuses they grant accumulate so paltry and slow when compared to the bonuses granted by items or spells. Training in a skill only mattered if it was a "trained-only" skill, and even then one rank would suffice.

And that brings us straight into the next big failing of the system. Skills offer little to no reward for investment. No new or interesting uses are unlocked for buying up more and more ranks, at least not past the +2 synergy bonuses at 5 ranks, or the rare 5 ranks in Balance. Even the Epic Skill uses, which are as unimpressive as they are exceedingly difficult, require only that a character is able to hit the DC and cares not a whit about the number of actual ranks he or she has.

As before, I hope to lead us through an in-depth review of the Skills section of the d20SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/index.htm) and discuss what I perceive to be flaws and follow-up with my own suggestions for fixing those flaws. Feel free to bring up your own thoughts about flaws and fixes as we move forward.

Designer's Note: Because this section has gotten incredibly large, I'm going to split Part 4 into two. Part 4 will deal with the underlying concepts and rules of the d20 skill system and what we decide to do with them. Part 5 then will deal with the actual skill list and the uses of skills thereof.

Let's start with the Skills Summary section after following the Skills link at the d20SRD homepage:


Skills Summary

If you buy a class skill, your character gets 1 rank (equal to a +1 bonus on checks with that skill) for each skill point. If you buy other classes’ skills (cross-class skills), you get ½ rank per skill point.

Your maximum rank in a class skill is your character level + 3.

Your maximum rank in a cross-class skill is one-half of this number (do not round up or down).

I already have issue with just about all of this. Most of it is unintuitive and the rest makes for unnecessarily hampered character development.

If we're dealing in skill ranks and you buy one, it should stand to reason that you actually get a rank and not half of a rank (which is useless). I have no problem with some role-protection between classes being exercised in the form of class skills and cross-class skills, but a rank should be a rank even if it must cost a little extra because it's cross-class.

In the same vein, maximum rank should not differ between class skills and cross-class skills. There's no reason to punish cross-class investment in two different ways and forcing it into half the effective potency simply means that it becomes irrelevant.

Finally, why character level +3? It's just an odd number that is unnecessary. No, to me, I'd rather base maximums on character level and multiples thereof wherever possible and leave it at that.


Skill Ranks

A character’s number of ranks in a skill is based on how many skill points a character has invested in a skill. Many skills can be used even if the character has no ranks in them; doing this is called making an untrained skill check.

At this point, we have established our own new set of skill ranks. There are just five of them, and the rank itself isn't determined solely by the number of skill points invested in the skill (because a character can spend many more skill points in a skill than the skill's rank).

I propose that all of the skills be useable even if a character has no ranks in them, but that new uses for the skills be unlocked by a higher rank. For example, perhaps all characters could attempt Acrobatics checks to maintain their balance on a difficult surface, but making an Acrobatics check to tumble safely around foes could require a rank or a few in the skill.

A skill's rank grants the character a Competence Bonus to d20 rolls made relevant to that skill, but should also unlock new skill uses as well as a host of level-appropriate Skill Tricks. Skill Tricks might even include such things as maneuvers and even spells. I have ideas that would make it possible to include many different such subsystems within the Skills system allowing for great breadth and depth of player options when creating a character, regardless of class chosen. I'll get more into specifics when I get to talking about the actual Skill list.


Using Skills

When your character uses a skill, you make a skill check to see how well he or she does. The higher the result of the skill check, the better. Based on the circumstances, your result must match or beat a particular number (a DC or the result of an opposed skill check) for the check to be successful. The harder the task, the higher the number you need to roll.

This is well and good and needs little to no change. The only thing I would like to add is degrees and success/failure. It would be my goal to see to it that each usage of a skill have a few degrees of success and failure to make task resolution less of a binary thing.


Circumstances can affect your check. A character who is free to work without distractions can make a careful attempt and avoid simple mistakes. A character who has lots of time can try over and over again, thereby assuring the best outcome. If others help, the character may succeed where otherwise he or she would fail.

This foreshadows Take 10 and Take 20 mechanics as well as Aid mechanics. The Take 10 and Take 20 mechanics serve the game well, I think, but the Aid mechanics could use a lot of revision. But we'll talk more of that when we get there.


Skill Checks

A skill check takes into account a character’s training (skill rank), natural talent (ability modifier), and luck (the die roll). It may also take into account his or her race’s knack for doing certain things (racial bonus) or what armor he or she is wearing (armor check penalty), or a certain feat the character possesses, among other things.

To make a skill check, roll 1d20 and add your character’s skill modifier for that skill. The skill modifier incorporates the character’s ranks in that skill and the ability modifier for that skill’s key ability, plus any other miscellaneous modifiers that may apply, including racial bonuses and armor check penalties. The higher the result, the better. Unlike with attack rolls and saving throws, a natural roll of 20 on the d20 is not an automatic success, and a natural roll of 1 is not an automatic failure.

More of the same here, some streamlining will be expected with the massive condensing of modifier types going on. Also of note is the mention of automatic success/failure. Either skills will use it like everything else does, or nothing will use automatic success/failure. If the traditional version of the "roll 20 = critical hit" has to be lost in favor of the less binary degrees of success/failure mechanism, I'm okay with that. I do plan to test it out using automatic success/failure in addition to degrees. If it's possible.


Difficulty Class

Some checks are made against a Difficulty Class (DC). The DC is a number (set using the skill rules as a guideline) that you must score as a result on your skill check in order to succeed.

Difficulty (DC)|Example (Skill Used)

Very Easy (0)|Notice something large in plain sight (Spot)
Easy (5)|Climb a knotted rope (Climb)
Average (10)|Hear an approaching guard (Listen)
Tough (15)|Rig a wagon wheel to fall off (Disable Device)
Challenging (20)|Swim in stormy weather (Swim)
Formidable (25)|Open an average lock (Open Lock)
Heroic (30)|Leap across a 30-foot chasm (Jump)
Nearly Impossible (40)|Track a squad of orcs across hard ground after 24 hours of rainfall (Survival)


Now we have mention made of "checks" and "difficulty class" two important game terms that I'd like to clearly define and more completely apply throughout the game. A check is any d20 roll. Easy and clear enough? There's no need whatsoever to call different d20 rolls different things. We don't need attack rolls and skill checks and saving throws. Everything should be a check. It makes the game simpler to learn. Most, if not all, checks are rolled against a difficulty class, or DC, the target number you must meet or exceed for your action to work as planned.

With that bit out of the way, let's talk about those DCs listed above. With ability scores capped at 20 and our chassis outlined, we can plug in expected outputs. At first level, with an ability score of 18 and Novice rank in a skill, the bonus is +6. That means, 85% of the time such a character can perform an Average task with no difficulty, and 60% of the time the character can perform a Tough task. The character can't perform any Heroic tasks as yet, but has a 35% chance to perform a Challenging task and on a roll of 19 or 20 can perform a Formidable task. This assumes no special circumstances and no Enhancement or Item bonuses. At 20th level, the same character, with an ability score of 20 and Legend rank in a skill, has a bonus of +25. He can routinely perform Formidable tasks, has an 80% chance to perform Heroic tasks, and a 30% chance to perform Nearly Impossible tasks (again, assuming no special circumstances or other bonuses). This all sounds pretty good to me, which is nice, because it means that we don't have to do a lot of fiddling with the DCs. Keeping things between 0 and 40 is easy to work with.

In most cases the only numbers we need to worry about are 5, 10, 15, and 20. A DC that is 20 points higher than the highest character's bonus is Nearly Impossible. A DC that is 5 points higher is Easy. As a rule of thumb, it should be noted to DMs that DCs should generally be tabulated so that they stay around 5 points higher than the best character's bonus and around 15 points higher than the worst character's. Obviously this will vary some between circumstances and encounters, but that's the "sweet spot."


Opposed Checks

An opposed check is a check whose success or failure is determined by comparing the check result to another character’s check result. In an opposed check, the higher result succeeds, while the lower result fails. In case of a tie, the higher skill modifier wins. If these scores are the same, roll again to break the tie.

Here's an interesting one. We've been talking a lot about degrees of success and failure. Against a static DC, that's easy to handle, but when dealing with opposed checks, how should we utilize degrees of success and failure? The Bull Rush action uses degrees of success. Can we look to that as a model? Put the degrees of success or failure on the shoulders of the aggressor? Are there any situations where there is an opposed check with no clear aggressor?


Trying Again

In general, you can try a skill check again if you fail, and you can keep trying indefinitely. Some skills, however, have consequences of failure that must be taken into account. A few skills are virtually useless once a check has failed on an attempt to accomplish a particular task. For most skills, when a character has succeeded once at a given task, additional successes are meaningless.

For the most part, this makes sense, and will be handled on a case-by-case basis as skill design arises. The last sentence there has me thinking though. How best to handle the concept of "skill challenges" or non-combat encounters? 4e did a very lackluster job of this. I don't think any special new subsystem needs to be made to handle it. Skills should be enough. But care and imagination needs to be used to craft non-combat encounters so that they are exciting and guidelines in the rules document would be welcome. Those guidelines should probably be present in the Skills chapter (as well as the Exploration and Environment chapters. Those guidelines will probably be something we hash out a little in playtesting and flesh out much later, but we can still discuss a little right now and more as we move forward.


Untrained Skill Checks

Generally, if your character attempts to use a skill he or she does not possess, you make a skill check as normal. The skill modifier doesn’t have a skill rank added in because the character has no ranks in the skill. Any other applicable modifiers, such as the modifier for the skill’s key ability, are applied to the check.

Many skills can be used only by someone who is trained in them.

It's my goal that all skills have a basic use that anyone can use even untrained. DCs from 0 to 20 can handle tasks of this nature. From there, I also want to have a new use for each skill that comes with each rank that can only be used by a character with at least that rank in the skill.


Favorable And Unfavorable Conditions

Some situations may make a skill easier or harder to use, resulting in a bonus or penalty to the skill modifier for a skill check or a change to the DC of the skill check.

The chance of success can be altered in four ways to take into account exceptional circumstances.


Give the skill user a +2 circumstance bonus to represent conditions that improve performance, such as having the perfect tool for the job, getting help from another character (see Combining Skill Attempts), or possessing unusually accurate information.
Give the skill user a -2 circumstance penalty to represent conditions that hamper performance, such as being forced to use improvised tools or having misleading information.
Reduce the DC by 2 to represent circumstances that make the task easier, such as having a friendly audience or doing work that can be subpar.
Increase the DC by 2 to represent circumstances that make the task harder, such as having an uncooperative audience or doing work that must be flawless.


Conditions that affect your character’s ability to perform the skill change the skill modifier. Conditions that modify how well the character has to perform the skill to succeed change the DC. A bonus to the skill modifier and a reduction in the check’s DC have the same result: They create a better chance of success. But they represent different circumstances, and sometimes that difference is important.

This is important and can probably work perfectly fine as written. Should all circumstance modifiers by +/-2?


Time And Skill Checks

Using a skill might take a round, take no time, or take several rounds or even longer. Most skill uses are standard actions, move actions, or full-round actions. Types of actions define how long activities take to perform within the framework of a combat round (6 seconds) and how movement is treated with respect to the activity. Some skill checks are instant and represent reactions to an event, or are included as part of an action.

These skill checks are not actions. Other skill checks represent part of movement.

I see no reason to fiddle with these rules. Different uses of skills represent different expenditure of time. That's perfectly reasonable and to be expected. Some articles may need to be slightly altered or clarified or changed on a case-by-case basis, but that will come later.


Checks Without Rolls

A skill check represents an attempt to accomplish some goal, usually while under some sort of time pressure or distraction. Sometimes, though, a character can use a skill under more favorable conditions and eliminate the luck factor.
Taking 10

When your character is not being threatened or distracted, you may choose to take 10. Instead of rolling 1d20 for the skill check, calculate your result as if you had rolled a 10. For many routine tasks, taking 10 makes them automatically successful. Distractions or threats (such as combat) make it impossible for a character to take 10. In most cases, taking 10 is purely a safety measure —you know (or expect) that an average roll will succeed but fear that a poor roll might fail, so you elect to settle for the average roll (a 10). Taking 10 is especially useful in situations where a particularly high roll wouldn’t help.
Taking 20

When you have plenty of time (generally 2 minutes for a skill that can normally be checked in 1 round, one full-round action, or one standard action), you are faced with no threats or distractions, and the skill being attempted carries no penalties for failure, you can take 20. In other words, eventually you will get a 20 on 1d20 if you roll enough times. Instead of rolling 1d20 for the skill check, just calculate your result as if you had rolled a 20.

Taking 20 means you are trying until you get it right, and it assumes that you fail many times before succeeding. Taking 20 takes twenty times as long as making a single check would take.

Since taking 20 assumes that the character will fail many times before succeeding, if you did attempt to take 20 on a skill that carries penalties for failure, your character would automatically incur those penalties before he or she could complete the task. Common “take 20” skills include Escape Artist, Open Lock, and Search.

I also see no reason to change these rules either. There was mention made in a previous thread about adding a Take 5 mechanism to the game in some way, and I think it's a good impulse that we should think about in the future. It shouldn't be something that anyone can do at any time (as neither Take 10 or Take 20 are), but it can be a useful tool to avoid failure (or at least the more nasty degrees of failure).


Ability Checks and Caster Level Checks

The normal take 10 and take 20 rules apply for ability checks. Neither rule applies to caster level checks.

I'd like to take this moment to suggest eliminating caster level from the game. Either it should all be based on character level, or the character's rank in some relevant skill such as Arcana or Religion. But maybe this is getting slightly ahead of ourselves.


Combining Skill Attempts

When more than one character tries the same skill at the same time and for the same purpose, their efforts may overlap.
Individual Events

Often, several characters attempt some action and each succeeds or fails independently. The result of one character’s Climb check does not influence the results of other characters Climb check.
Aid Another

You can help another character achieve success on his or her skill check by making the same kind of skill check in a cooperative effort. If you roll a 10 or higher on your check, the character you are helping gets a +2 bonus to his or her check, as per the rule for favorable conditions. (You can’t take 10 on a skill check to aid another.) In many cases, a character’s help won’t be beneficial, or only a limited number of characters can help at once.

In cases where the skill restricts who can achieve certain results you can’t aid another to grant a bonus to a task that your character couldn’t achieve alone.

See also: Aid Another in Combat

So, all of this is more rules that harkens toward non-combat encounter resolution. I mentioned earlier that the Aid Another action needs work. And it really does. Having Aid have nothing to do with the training of the Aider and Aidee and also nothing to do with the difficult of the task seems very wrong. I would also think that if we want an Aid action that it should have some degrees of success and failure like most everything else. It could also just be stricken from the rules and I doubt anyone would really notice. If you want to help your allies, you can just try the same action, or perform some other action that takes the pressure off your ally. Shrug. What should be done with this stuff?


Skill Synergy

It’s possible for a character to have two skills that work well together. In general, having 5 or more ranks in one skill gives the character a +2 bonus on skill checks with each of its synergistic skills, as noted in the skill description. In some cases, this bonus applies only to specific uses of the skill in question, and not to all checks. Some skills provide benefits on other checks made by a character, such as those checks required to use certain class features.

I find that these fiddly bonuses do too little and are too easily forgotten in the middle of gameplay. I advocate getting rid of the bonuses entirely, and possibly the whole concept of skill synergies. However, the concept could be salvaged and used in Skill Tricks that require ranks in more than one skill. Double shrug.


Ability Checks

Sometimes a character tries to do something to which no specific skill really applies. In these cases, you make an ability check. An ability check is a roll of 1d20 plus the appropriate ability modifier. Essentially, you’re making an untrained skill check.

In some cases, an action is a straight test of one’s ability with no luck involved. Just as you wouldn’t make a height check to see who is taller, you don’t make a Strength check to see who is stronger.

This seems fine to me and needs no changes. On something as basic as Ability Checks I'm not even sure if we want to mess with degrees of success/failure.

Yitzi
2013-05-10, 10:25 AM
One of the biggest failings of d20s basic Skill system is that the ranks themselves are almost meaningless and the bonuses they grant accumulate so paltry and slow when compared to the bonuses granted by items or spells. Training in a skill only mattered if it was a "trained-only" skill, and even then one rank would suffice.

And that brings us straight into the next big failing of the system. Skills offer little to no reward for investment. No new or interesting uses are unlocked for buying up more and more ranks, at least not past the +2 synergy bonuses at 5 ranks, or the rare 5 ranks in Balance. Even the Epic Skill uses, which are as unimpressive as they are exceedingly difficult, require only that a character is able to hit the DC and cares not a whit about the number of actual ranks he or she has.

I think this is an important point: Ranks should give bonuses based on the number of ranks, beyond the +1 per rank. A lot of this might be stuff that would otherwise be skill tricks; you can also includes stuff like "move full speed with no penalty to hide/move silently", hide in plain sight, even some feats such as blind-fight, and so on.

Consider having Skill Focus and +2/+2 feats give bonus ranks (which do not count toward the maximum) instead of bonuses to the roll; make sure to provide advantages for ranks up to a level that accounts for this. (For that matter, this means that it caps out at 28 ranks at level 20, so a nice capstone for the rogue might be 2 bonus ranks to one skill to bring it up to 30, with a truly impressive ability being the bonus for 30 ranks.)


I already have issue with just about all of this. Most of it is unintuitive and the rest makes for unnecessarily hampered character development.

If we're dealing in skill ranks and you buy one, it should stand to reason that you actually get a rank and not half of a rank (which is useless). I have no problem with some role-protection between classes being exercised in the form of class skills and cross-class skills, but a rank should be a rank even if it must cost a little extra because it's cross-class.

In the same vein, maximum rank should not differ between class skills and cross-class skills. There's no reason to punish cross-class investment in two different ways and forcing it into half the effective potency simply means that it becomes irrelevant.

I'd disagree, as I prefer more role-protection in terms of skills. I would actually go in the opposite direction (which would be a bit simpler):

You can spend one skill point per skill per level, getting 1 rank if it's in-class and 1/2 a rank if it's cross-class. If your first level is rogue, every point put in an in-class skill is worth 4 (for first level only); the same goes for rangers putting a rank in Survival and wizards putting it in Spellcraft.

erikun
2013-05-10, 11:44 AM
If we're dealing in skill ranks and you buy one, it should stand to reason that you actually get a rank and not half of a rank (which is useless). I have no problem with some role-protection between classes being exercised in the form of class skills and cross-class skills, but a rank should be a rank even if it must cost a little extra because it's cross-class.

In the same vein, maximum rank should not differ between class skills and cross-class skills. There's no reason to punish cross-class investment in two different ways and forcing it into half the effective potency simply means that it becomes irrelevant.

Finally, why character level +3? It's just an odd number that is unnecessary. No, to me, I'd rather base maximums on character level and multiples thereof wherever possible and leave it at that.
The purpose of half-ranks is because characters receive limited skill points each level (which they cannot save) and the cap on cross-class skills being half that of class skills. Changing that and allowing "cross-class" skills have a maximum rank equal to level eliminates the need for half-ranks each level, although doesn't resolve the problem of, say, having 1 spare skill point and just cross-class skills wanted.

Character level +3 for skill ranks was to make a difference between skilled individuals and unskilled at first level. Someone with 10 DEX but 4 ranks in hide is actually quite good at hiding, as good as someone wiht 18 DEX naturally. Your current system of Novice (+2) takes care of that, somewhat, although you might consider the possibility of increasing that to +4 if you want to simulate skills being initially easy to pick up and learn. It depends on how you want to system to play and how you want it to work.



I propose that all of the skills be useable even if a character has no ranks in them, but that new uses for the skills be unlocked by a higher rank. For example, perhaps all characters could attempt Acrobatics checks to maintain their balance on a difficult surface, but making an Acrobatics check to tumble safely around foes could require a rank or a few in the skill.

A skill's rank grants the character a Competence Bonus to d20 rolls made relevant to that skill, but should also unlock new skill uses as well as a host of level-appropriate Skill Tricks. Skill Tricks might even include such things as maneuvers and even spells. I have ideas that would make it possible to include many different such subsystems within the Skills system allowing for great breadth and depth of player options when creating a character, regardless of class chosen. I'll get more into specifics when I get to talking about the actual Skill list.
I wonder how much we're splitting hairs between saying "all skills can be useable untrained" and "Novice skill rank grants you a new trick that lets you do X which you couldn't before." Perhaps one could be merged into the other, or only have skill tricks only in the Expert-Legend ranks (especially if Novice is granting +4 instead).

For that matter, were you planning on having skill tricks be included with the skill ranks or be something that can be bought separately with skill points?



This is important and can probably work perfectly fine as written. Should all circumstance modifiers by +/-2?
+/-2 is supposed to be a minor bonus, and you'll note some bonuses of +5 or +10 in some situations (concealment, most notably). It depends of if you want bonuses to be minor and affect the character little, or if you want bonuses to be important and environmental effects to be more important.

Similarly, stacking these bonuses (3e "stack everything" vs 4e "only one combat advantage") will influence players with how much time they devote to getting good positioning/influencing battlefields versus just directly stabbing things to death.



I also see no reason to change these rules either. There was mention made in a previous thread about adding a Take 5 mechanism to the game in some way, and I think it's a good impulse that we should think about in the future. It shouldn't be something that anyone can do at any time (as neither Take 10 or Take 20 are), but it can be a useful tool to avoid failure (or at least the more nasty degrees of failure).
I've used "Take 5" to be the passive auto-success for a skill. That is, if the DC is bonus+5 or less and they would be expected to use it, then they automatically succeed. A good example would automatically succeeding in a spot check when walking through a dungeon and looking around.

Of course, it only works when the character would be actually doing something that would trigger the check. You don't automatically find secret doors with Search by passing by, although you would be examing the walls. You aren't automatically told the price of something with Appraise by glancing at it, but you would by holding it and looking it over.



I'd like to take this moment to suggest eliminating caster level from the game. Either it should all be based on character level, or the character's rank in some relevant skill such as Arcana or Religion. But maybe this is getting slightly ahead of ourselves.
There are reasons for caster level, most notably to make a spellcaster more powerful without granting them more spells (or to make up for multiclassing awkwardness). Still, it can probably be fixed better with changing the system and just making them level checks.



I find that these fiddly bonuses do too little and are too easily forgotten in the middle of gameplay. I advocate getting rid of the bonuses entirely, and possibly the whole concept of skill synergies. However, the concept could be salvaged and used in Skill Tricks that require ranks in more than one skill. Double shrug.
This seems fine to me. The +2 bonuses are too easily forgotten, espeically when they are situational. Skill tricks sound like a good thing to have in exchange.

Ziegander
2013-05-10, 01:02 PM
I think this is an important point: Ranks should give bonuses based on the number of ranks, beyond the +1 per rank. A lot of this might be stuff that would otherwise be skill tricks; you can also includes stuff like "move full speed with no penalty to hide/move silently", hide in plain sight, even some feats such as blind-fight, and so on.

Certainly.


Consider having Skill Focus and +2/+2 feats give bonus ranks (which do not count toward the maximum) instead of bonuses to the roll; make sure to provide advantages for ranks up to a level that accounts for this.

Well, the way I'm planning to design skill ranks something like this shouldn't be necessary. A single skill rank, or even four, wouldn't be worth what a feat is.


I'd disagree, as I prefer more role-protection in terms of skills. I would actually go in the opposite direction (which would be a bit simpler):

You can spend one skill point per skill per level, getting 1 rank if it's in-class and 1/2 a rank if it's cross-class. If your first level is rogue, every point put in an in-class skill is worth 4 (for first level only); the same goes for rangers putting a rank in Survival and wizards putting it in Spellcraft.

That's essentially exactly how the game already works. My plan is to still utilize class and cross-class skills, but to allow characters to purchase the same number of ranks in cross-class skills as class skills, they just have to pay double.

For still greater role-protection, maybe I could design skill tricks that can only be taken by characters of certain classes.


The purpose of half-ranks is because characters receive limited skill points each level (which they cannot save) and the cap on cross-class skills being half that of class skills.

Well then perhaps characters should be able to save up skill points. There's really no reason not to spend them, since rank is limited by character level and I plan to offer plenty of horizontal advancement options, but allowing characters to save points when they have nothing to spend them on seems fine to me. Half-ranks or saving skill points essentially does the same thing.

EDIT: Actually, how about I stick to no saving skill points, and leave half ranks in, but I make them actually a useful mid-point between having no ranks and having a real rank? A Half-Rank could grant a +1 bonus and allow you to use the new use given for that Rank, but you cannot buy skill tricks for that Rank until you buy the full Rank?


Character level +3 for skill ranks was to make a difference between skilled individuals and unskilled at first level. Someone with 10 DEX but 4 ranks in hide is actually quite good at hiding, as good as someone wiht 18 DEX naturally. Your current system of Novice (+2) takes care of that, somewhat, although you might consider the possibility of increasing that to +4 if you want to simulate skills being initially easy to pick up and learn. It depends on how you want to system to play and how you want it to work.

I'm not trying to make skills initially easy to pick up, I just mean for the vertical advancement (the raw bonus to d20 rolls) to be easy to gain. The options that rely on that bonus, the skill tricks, are more expensive.


I wonder how much we're splitting hairs between saying "all skills can be useable untrained" and "Novice skill rank grants you a new trick that lets you do X which you couldn't before." Perhaps one could be merged into the other, or only have skill tricks only in the Expert-Legend ranks (especially if Novice is granting +4 instead).

For that matter, were you planning on having skill tricks be included with the skill ranks or be something that can be bought separately with skill points?

Skill Tricks would not be included with Rank. My planned model is that a Rank in a class skill costs 1 skill point and a Trick in a class skill costs 2, while a Rank in a cross-class skill costs 2 skill points and a Trick in a cross-class skill costs 4.


+/-2 is supposed to be a minor bonus, and you'll note some bonuses of +5 or +10 in some situations (concealment, most notably). It depends of if you want bonuses to be minor and affect the character little, or if you want bonuses to be important and environmental effects to be more important.

Similarly, stacking these bonuses (3e "stack everything" vs 4e "only one combat advantage") will influence players with how much time they devote to getting good positioning/influencing battlefields versus just directly stabbing things to death.

My thought was that circumstance bonuses will always stack, a la 3e, and that circumstance bonuses should always be doled out in +/-2 increments. Does anyone else have any other thoughts?


I've used "Take 5" to be the passive auto-success for a skill. That is, if the DC is bonus+5 or less and they would be expected to use it, then they automatically succeed. A good example would automatically succeeding in a spot check when walking through a dungeon and looking around.

Of course, it only works when the character would be actually doing something that would trigger the check. You don't automatically find secret doors with Search by passing by, although you would be examing the walls. You aren't automatically told the price of something with Appraise by glancing at it, but you would by holding it and looking it over.

I wouldn't want to use that model, though I can see how it would be perfectly workable, because it messes with the math I was planning for. Generally, I want to design the game so that characters of any level with the highest bonus have around a 75% chance to succeed at actions using that bonus. If a DC is bonus+5, that's an 80% chance. I don't want to shorten the RNG from 1-20 to 5-15 if you see what I mean.

General Patton
2013-05-10, 01:47 PM
So, all of this is more rules that harkens toward non-combat encounter resolution. I mentioned earlier that the Aid Another action needs work. And it really does. Having Aid have nothing to do with the training of the Aider and Aidee and also nothing to do with the difficult of the task seems very wrong. I would also think that if we want an Aid action that it should have some degrees of success and failure like most everything else. It could also just be stricken from the rules and I doubt anyone would really notice. If you want to help your allies, you can just try the same action, or perform some other action that takes the pressure off your ally. Shrug. What should be done with this stuff?

How about this? The Aider rolls their skill check vs a DC 10 less than the actual check DC. Passing that is one degree of success, plus an additional degree of success for every 4 that the check exceeds the DC-10, up to a maximum number of degrees equal to 1+ranks. Failing is one degree of failure plus an additional degree of failure for every 4 that the check falls short. Each degree of success or failure is a +/-2.
-Additionally, with 1 rank, the number of degrees of failure is limited to at most 2.
-With 2 ranks, if your check result exceeds that of the Aidee then you may choose to "switch roles" with the Aidee and treat them as your Aider instead (solution to the weird problem of an unskilled character rolling way better than the one they're helping).
-With 3 ranks, you may apply the bonuses from your degrees of success to the check results of other Aiders whose check result was less than your own. An Aider may only receive these bonuses from one other Aider at a time.
-With 4 ranks, you may Take 10 on Aid Another.
-With 5 ranks, you may Take 20 on Aid Another.

Let's consider a situation of 3 level 10 characters dealing with a DC 35 trap.
-Fighter, 14 Dex, 1 rank, +9 bonus
-Ranger, 18 Dex, 2 ranks, +13 bonus
-Rogue, 20 Dex, 3 ranks, +16 bonus
They start out with the Ranger and Fighter Aiding the Rogue
Fighter rolls a 18. 27 vs DC 25. One degree of success.
Ranger rolls an 18. 31 vs DC 25. Two degrees of success.
Rogue rolls a 12. 28+6=34 vs DC 35. Failure.
After rechecking the math for the Rogue Aiding the Ranger (because he has 2 ranks and did better than the Rogue), we instead have.
Rogue rolls a 12. 28 vs DC 25. One degree of success.
Fighter rolls a 18. 27+2(from the Rogue's help because 28>27)=29 vs DC 25. Two degrees of success.
Ranger rolls an 18. 31+6=37 vs DC 35. Success.

Ziegander
2013-05-10, 03:08 PM
How about this? The Aider rolls their skill check vs a DC 10 less than the actual check DC. Passing that is one degree of success, plus an additional degree of success for every 4 that the check exceeds the DC-10, up to a maximum number of degrees equal to 1+ranks. Failing is one degree of failure plus an additional degree of failure for every 4 that the check falls short. Each degree of success or failure is a +/-2.
-Additionally, with 1 rank, the number of degrees of failure is limited to at most 2.
-With 2 ranks, if your check result exceeds that of the Aidee then you may choose to "switch roles" with the Aidee and treat them as your Aider instead (solution to the weird problem of an unskilled character rolling way better than the one they're helping).
-With 3 ranks, you may apply the bonuses from your degrees of success to the check results of other Aiders whose check result was less than your own. An Aider may only receive these bonuses from one other Aider at a time.
-With 4 ranks, you may Take 10 on Aid Another.
-With 5 ranks, you may Take 20 on Aid Another.

Let's consider a situation of 3 level 10 characters dealing with a DC 35 trap.
-Fighter, 14 Dex, 1 rank, +9 bonus
-Ranger, 18 Dex, 2 ranks, +13 bonus
-Rogue, 20 Dex, 3 ranks, +16 bonus
They start out with the Ranger and Fighter Aiding the Rogue
Fighter rolls a 18. 27 vs DC 25. One degree of success.
Ranger rolls an 18. 31 vs DC 25. Two degrees of success.
Rogue rolls a 12. 28+6=34 vs DC 35. Failure.
After rechecking the math for the Rogue Aiding the Ranger (because he has 2 ranks and did better than the Rogue), we instead have.
Rogue rolls a 12. 28 vs DC 25. One degree of success.
Fighter rolls a 18. 27+2(from the Rogue's help because 28>27)=29 vs DC 25. Two degrees of success.
Ranger rolls an 18. 31+6=37 vs DC 35. Success.

Not bad at all. It's a little complicated at first glance, but it can be simplified. I think I would prefer that, for tasks which require Ranks to attempt, the Aider must also have at least that many ranks in order to offer Aid. Also, I think it's a bit much for all of those extra Aid benefits based on Rank. I would leave those out.

Overall, though, a fine rule.

eftexar
2013-05-10, 07:45 PM
I've always thought skill ranks were over inflated. I feel that even if you give interesting things at certain skill ranks the variance is a problem. It places similar, but not quite as bad, problems as the 6 and 12 save gap or the armor doesn't actually do anything problem.
Furthermore, removing too many restrictions on skills eliminates the individuality of classes somewhat. Why not allow 'untrained' and 'trained' tasks? Trained tasks can only be used by somehow possessing a class for which it is a class skill.

In my opinion you aren't changing things enough. I would rather see something, where skill rank does not equal check, structured like this:

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

Using Skills
When making a skill check you use the skills associated ability modifier, rolling a d20, and add the skill bonus provided by your ranks in the respective skill. You can't perform trained tasks unless the skill is a class skill for you.
Regardless of the number of ranks you have in a skill you take a -3 penalty to checks with it if it isn't a class skill. Your maximum skill ranks, in any particular skill, are limited to 3 + your total HD.

{table=head]Skill Rank|Bonus to Check


0|
-1


1|
+1


3|
+2


6|
+3


9|
+4


12|
+5


15|
+6


18|
+7


++3|
++

[/table]


Tumble
Dex; Armor Penalty (Yes)

{table=head]Terrain|Penalty

Lightly Obstructed|
-2

Severely Obstructed|
-5

Lightly Slippery|
-2

Severely Slippery|
-5

Slopped or Angled|
-2*

Water (or Deep Bog)|
-10*

[/table]
*except Soften Landing, for which it is a bonus instead

Untrained Tasks

Duck and Weave
You can tumble up to half your speed, as a move action, to avoid attacks of opportunity. Opponents are allowed to oppose your tumble check with a sense motive check. If their check exceeds yours they can make attacks of opportunity.

Soften Landing
You can tumble up to soften your landing if you fall. If you succeed on a DC 10 tumble check you treat a fall as if it were 10ft lower, plus an additional 5ft per +2 the DC is exceeded.

Trained Tasks
A character who possesses Tumble as a class skill can use it to Perform as if it were the Perform skill.

Accelerated Tumble
Required Ranks: Tumble 4
When you use the Duck and Weave function you can take a -4 penalty to your check to move at your full speed (instead of only half). You may not use the Detour function while using Accelerated Tumble.

Detour
Required Ranks: Tumble 8
When you use the Duck and Weave function you can also move through occupied spaces.

Kip Up
Required Ranks: Tumble 12
You can stand up from prone as a swift action. With a succesfull tumble check, versus any opponent(s) sense motive check, you don't provoke any attacks of opportunity from them.

Vault
Required Ranks: Tumble 16
You can climb a vertical surface by vaulting between two surfaces, such as walls or tress, with 10ft of each other. You must succeed on a DC 20 check to vault up 10ft.
You can vault multiple times, but if you don't land, for a moment, on a normal surface between each vault the DC increases by a cumulative +2.

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

[edit]: Here's some of my thoughts behind the above:

It grants additional capabilities for higher ranks, but since ranks offer a bonus to your skill check (instead of being the skill check) there is always a chance of failure until epic levels.

I assume skill focus will still be available, so it could offer a +2 bonus and the ability to take 10. And classes that extend the use of skills would suddenly become useful.

This simultaneously makes skills more useful, avoids scaling issues, and allows everyone to use it to some extent. Meanwhile, trained tasks let a class with a class skill still feeling special about it.

Also, since magic items give a bonus to the check, and not skill ranks, they don't grant the extended functions. This makes skills relevant over magic again.

In my example above tumbling past opponents is an opposed check. Why? If more skills require opposed checks it encourages other players to plug in skill points into all of their skills. Flat DCs need eliminated where possible.

And I think I can call my massive wall of text finished.

Seerow
2013-05-10, 09:03 PM
How about this? The Aider rolls their skill check vs a DC 10 less than the actual check DC. Passing that is one degree of success, plus an additional degree of success for every 4 that the check exceeds the DC-10, up to a maximum number of degrees equal to 1+ranks. Failing is one degree of failure plus an additional degree of failure for every 4 that the check falls short. Each degree of success or failure is a +/-2.
-Additionally, with 1 rank, the number of degrees of failure is limited to at most 2.
-With 2 ranks, if your check result exceeds that of the Aidee then you may choose to "switch roles" with the Aidee and treat them as your Aider instead (solution to the weird problem of an unskilled character rolling way better than the one they're helping).
-With 3 ranks, you may apply the bonuses from your degrees of success to the check results of other Aiders whose check result was less than your own. An Aider may only receive these bonuses from one other Aider at a time.
-With 4 ranks, you may Take 10 on Aid Another.
-With 5 ranks, you may Take 20 on Aid Another.

Unless you allow someone with 5 skill ranks to take 20 on normal skill checks, once you get skill rank 5 this is always going to result in the person with higher skill attempting to aid the person with lower skill, so that he can then swap places with them and get the free 20. I doubt that's what you intended, but I don't see anything that prevents it.


That said, I do like the general intent here. Do you mind me cribbing some of it for my own skill system?

Ziegander
2013-05-11, 12:04 PM
I've always thought skill ranks were over inflated. I feel that even if you give interesting things at certain skill ranks the variance is a problem. It places similar, but not quite as bad, problems as the 6 and 12 save gap or the armor doesn't actually do anything problem.

Agreed. That's exactly why I disagree with having every rank give a +1 to the check and with there needing to be 20+ skill ranks that don't really do anything.


Furthermore, removing too many restrictions on skills eliminates the individuality of classes somewhat.

Is this really true? I understand some small concerns, but if that were the case, then do you call into question the individuality of D&D 3.5 classes that share similar class skills? The Bard and the Spellthief? The Cleric and the Binder?

I hope to have enough experience designing classes that I can assure enough individuality between the classes by allowing them unique class features and subsystems.


Why not allow 'untrained' and 'trained' tasks? Trained tasks can only be used by somehow possessing a class for which it is a class skill.

I was planning to do something similar, but instead Trained tasks would require X ranks in the skill in question.


In my opinion you aren't changing things enough. I would rather see something, where skill rank does not equal check [...]

Perhaps my choice of words failed me, but I am planning a system where rank =/= check. Five ranks, Novice, Expert, Master, Paragon, Legend. Each gives a +2 competence bonus. The check is, of course, Roll d20 add modifiers (including inherent modifiers, competence bonus, and other stuff like item bonuses or temporary buffs). If you mean that Rank =/= check bonus, then I think my model serves well. Ranks give you only about half of your total check bonus.


[...] structured like this:

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

Using Skills
When making a skill check you use the skills associated ability modifier, rolling a d20, and add the skill bonus provided by your ranks in the respective skill. You can't perform trained tasks unless the skill is a class skill for you.
Regardless of the number of ranks you have in a skill you take a -3 penalty to checks with it if it isn't a class skill. Your maximum skill ranks, in any particular skill, are limited to 3 + your total HD.

{table=head]Skill Rank|Bonus to Check


0|
-1


1|
+1


3|
+2


6|
+3


9|
+4


12|
+5


15|
+6


18|
+7


++3|
++

[/table]

Tumble
Dex; Armor Penalty (Yes)

{table=head]Terrain|Penalty

Lightly Obstructed|
-2

Severely Obstructed|
-5

Lightly Slippery|
-2

Severely Slippery|
-5

Slopped or Angled|
-2*

Water (or Deep Bog)|
-10*

[/table]
*except Soften Landing, for which it is a bonus instead

Untrained Tasks

Duck and Weave
You can tumble up to half your speed, as a move action, to avoid attacks of opportunity. Opponents are allowed to oppose your tumble check with a sense motive check. If their check exceeds yours they can make attacks of opportunity.

Soften Landing
You can tumble up to soften your landing if you fall. If you succeed on a DC 10 tumble check you treat a fall as if it were 10ft lower, plus an additional 5ft per +2 the DC is exceeded.

Trained Tasks
A character who possesses Tumble as a class skill can use it to Perform as if it were the Perform skill.

Accelerated Tumble
Required Ranks: Tumble 4
When you use the Duck and Weave function you can take a -4 penalty to your check to move at your full speed (instead of only half). You may not use the Detour function while using Accelerated Tumble.

Detour
Required Ranks: Tumble 8
When you use the Duck and Weave function you can also move through occupied spaces.

Kip Up
Required Ranks: Tumble 12
You can stand up from prone as a swift action. With a succesfull tumble check, versus any opponent(s) sense motive check, you don't provoke any attacks of opportunity from them.

Vault
Required Ranks: Tumble 16
You can climb a vertical surface by vaulting between two surfaces, such as walls or tress, with 10ft of each other. You must succeed on a DC 20 check to vault up 10ft.
You can vault multiple times, but if you don't land, for a moment, on a normal surface between each vault the DC increases by a cumulative +2.

This is almost identical to the approach I am planning to take except that it seems to change how skills work even less, which doesn't seem to line up to your complaint about my proposal. The only differences I see are:


1) You maintain the level +3 max ranks issue. I would condense these all the way down to five ranks.

2) You offer new skill uses only to those with an appropriate number of ranks and with that skill as class skill. This makes multiclassing an important thing for skill usage. I would offer the new uses to anyone that has the ranks, cross-class ranks would just cost double.

3) Out of 23 possible skill ranks from levels 1 to 20, more than half of those are useless speedbumps in between ranks that actually grant something meaningful. Instead of (or possibly in addition to) a feat tax, players will now have to pay a skill point tax. Out of my five ranks, each of them offers a vertical advancement and I plan to have them offer a wide variety of horizontal advancement. The skill will gain new uses, such as the ones you've outlined above in your Tumble write up, but also new powers such as 4e's Utility powers but also things like maneuvers and spells.


This simultaneously makes skills more useful, avoids scaling issues, and allows everyone to use it to some extent. Meanwhile, trained tasks let a class with a class skill still feeling special about it.

I am persuaded by your argument that class skills should be a bit more important than I am making them. So, I think I will have a list of skill tricks for each skill that are class-skill only and a list that can be taken cross-class.


Also, since magic items give a bonus to the check, and not skill ranks, they don't grant the extended functions. This makes skills relevant over magic again.

This is something that will also be true under my model. Honestly, the more I think on it, the more I think I like your model. Both of ours can basically achieve the same things, but yours hems closer to the standard d20 skill ranks methodology and also makes Intelligence modifier matter a bit less, which was a concern of mine (as well as simply having too many skill points). My only concern, then, would be making sure that vertical advancement was easy and horizontal advancement was the tricky part.


In my example above tumbling past opponents is an opposed check. Why? If more skills require opposed checks it encourages other players to plug in skill points into all of their skills. Flat DCs need eliminated where possible.

I agree that having more opposed checks is good, but I disagree that flat DCs need eliminated. Having little to no flat DCs makes for a less believable and predictable world. What needs eliminated are skill bonuses that make you just as good as a guy with the actual ranks. Which we've both already made great strides against.

Blightedmarsh
2013-05-11, 12:43 PM
I am for a pathfinder style consolidated skill list with specific skill focuses.

For example:

Acrobatics is a root skill:
-Tumble
-Balance
-Dodge

The skill foci give specific bonuses to specific skill use whereas the root skill governs a wide variety of usages.

NB: This only works if the skill foci are easier to acquire and stack than skills or feats.

Zovc
2013-05-11, 02:18 PM
I really like what you're doing! I remember seeing your first part a while back and being interested in seeing how it would unfold. Catching up, I had a bad taste in my mouth at first, but after looking through the old threads, I'm still on board and in agreement.

I suspect this system ending up more divergent and more in the spirit of what 3.0 and 3.5 were supposed to be than Pathfinder or a lot of other reworks achieved. From what I can tell, you've got the right outlook and insight to make it happen. :)

Apologies if I'm being redundant or coming out of left field or going in the wrong direction, I'm just a little eager and late to the party here.

I'm a big fan of skill tricks. I wish there were more of them, and I'd like to see them incorporated here. My first suggestion would be to consider awarding skill tricks at each tier of proficiency in a skill. For example, when I gain Novice proficiency in a skill, I gain access to a related, basic skill trick of my coice. When I level my proficiency in the same skill, I get to pick another related skill trick from either the same pool, or even a more complex/powerful group.

Basically, there'd be 2-5ish skill tricks associated with each rank of a skill's proficiency, and each time you acquired a higher rank, you'd get to pick another skill trick from your new rank or lower. This seems to be in line with you wanting even characters who invest in the same things to be potentially divergent without significantly 'affecting the RNG.' This would also help differentiate people who are invested in a skill from people who are merely attempting a skill they are not proficient with. You could then also perhaps have a feat that allows players to pick so many new skill tricks and totally eschew skill points buying skill tricks. The flat bonus on Skill Focus would suffer -1, but it could now grant you a skill trick along with it.

As far as progression is concerned, I think your proposed system is much, much more elegant than traditional 3rd/3.5. I think you have a pretty elegant translation from the skill progression attached to current classes, though. A rough fraction/percentage modifier to the number of ranks a given class gets per level translates pretty nicely to a number of skills you can maximize your proficiency in.

Let's say your new Rogues get 5 proficiencies (which may or may not be a lot after redefining and consolidating skills, but it's an example) to distribute how they want every 4 levels. (Tying this exclisively to class certainly makes multiclassing clumsier than it needs to be.) A rogue can be expected to have the epitome of a given level's proficiency in the skills (s)he is investing in, but could also invest in a different skills every four levels if (s)he felt so inclined.

Like I said, I feel like tying skills exclusively to class is a little clunky. I think, perhaps, skill-monkey classes should grant bonus proficiencies rather than 'skill points' at all, and characters have a certain number of 'skill points' based on their abilities and level. So characters get (2?)+Int modifier proficiencies per four levels level, plus specific proficiencies from their class per four levels, plus perhaps open-ended proficiencies from their class as well.

Tying bonus skills to specific class levels is weird, too. Perhaps once your class grants you a bonus proficiency, it scales with your character level? Or perhaps it scales with your class level + 1/2 your other levels? And there could be a feat that makes your class proficiencies scale with your character level if you with the latter option.

Ziegander
2013-05-11, 02:19 PM
I am for a pathfinder style consolidated skill list with specific skill focuses.

Speaking of a consolidated skill list, yes, I agree, I want a smaller set of skills with the aim that each skill is as important to players as the others. This is likely impossible to get perfect, but aiming for balance is best wherever possible.

Having said this...

On Classes: I'm not sure yet. This is something that must come last. I would say even last after coming up with possible campaign settings, monsters, and magic systems. I would like to design the base classes tailored to campaign settings themselves. No set of "core classes" will be appropriate for play in any game, and yet core rules generally try to make themselves useful for as many types of gameplay as possible. Having classes as part of the core rules feels rather against the grain. From a software standpoint, I'd like my core rules to function like a game engine, offering all of the technical things that make the world work, and then I'd like to design campaign settings as the actual games that use the engine and featuring all of the other content like classes, feats, magic systems, monsters, etc.

Fighter would actually not necessarily be a class that I would want to design for my game. To reference my approach above, I might rather design classes specific to worlds themselves. If I were in the Forgotten Realms, then I'd want lots of classes with deep ties to magic, including warrior classes that also use magic, such as Bladesingers and Paladins. But in a setting like Middle-Earth, such high magic would be inappropriate, and any magic-user class(es) would need to be far more subdued in their spellcasting and simultaneously more robust in non-casting abilities.

...in the previous thread, I would like to stand by it and design the game in its entirety based around those principles. As such, while skills like Acrobatics and Athletics can make perfect sense in a game of just about any type, other skills such as Arcana only fit in certain types of games. So, what should the consolidated skill list look like?


For example:

Acrobatics is a root skill:
-Tumble
-Balance
-Dodge

The skill foci give specific bonuses to specific skill use whereas the root skill governs a wide variety of usages.

NB: This only works if the skill foci are easier to acquire and stack than skills or feats.

This is interesting. In the interest of making vertical advancement easy, what if Skill Focus was a skill trick that required Novice rank (or whatever analog we contrive) that essentially gave you the next ranks' bonus to d20 rolls for free when you gained the appropriate levels? This way, for characters who lack for skill points they can make sure that at least their d20 bonus keeps up with level even if they miss out on versatility because they can't afford as many skill tricks.


I really like what you're doing! I remember seeing your first part a while back and being interested in seeing how it would unfold. Catching up, I had a bad taste in my mouth at first, but after looking through the old threads, I'm still on board and in agreement.

I suspect this system ending up more divergent and more in the spirit of what 3.0 and 3.5 were supposed to be than Pathfinder or a lot of other reworks achieved. From what I can tell, you've got the right outlook and insight to make it happen. :)

Thanks, man! You really know how to make a dude feel awesome. I'm going to need this sort of encouragement in order to finish this project. :smallsmile:


I'm a big fan of skill tricks. I wish there were more of them, and I'd like to see them incorporated here. My first suggestion would be to consider awarding skill tricks at each tier of proficiency in a skill. For example, when I gain Novice proficiency in a skill, I gain access to a related, basic skill trick of my coice. When I level my proficiency in the same skill, I get to pick another related skill trick from either the same pool, or even a more complex/powerful group.

Basically, there'd be 2-5ish skill tricks associated with each rank of a skill's proficiency, and each time you acquired a higher rank, you'd get to pick another skill trick from your new rank or lower. This seems to be in line with you wanting even characters who invest in the same things to be potentially divergent without significantly 'affecting the RNG.' This would also help differentiate people who are invested in a skill from people who are merely attempting a skill they are not proficient with.

I actually want many and more skill tricks associated with each rank. I'd love to have dozens, honestly. But I want them to require additional investment beyond gaining the rank. Each rank will come with new skill uses, those are just an automatic perk of gaining the rank, but the skill tricks, stuff like Kip-Up, Ghost Sound, or Hide in Plain Sight, those cost additional skill points to acquire.


You could then also perhaps have a feat that allows players to pick so many new skill tricks and totally eschew skill points buying skill tricks.

Also a fine possibility and one that can help characters with few skill points catch up in terms of versatility.


Like I said, I feel like tying skills exclusively to class is a little clunky. I think, perhaps, skill-monkey classes should grant bonus proficiencies rather than 'skill points' at all, and characters have a certain number of 'skill points' based on their abilities and level. So characters get (2?)+Int modifier proficiencies per four levels level, plus specific proficiencies from their class per four levels, plus perhaps open-ended proficiencies from their class as well.

Tying bonus skills to specific class levels is weird, too. Perhaps once your class grants you a bonus proficiency, it scales with your character level? Or perhaps it scales with your class level + 1/2 your other levels? And there could be a feat that makes your class proficiencies scale with your character level if you with the latter option.

I can see your point. And granting new "ranks" or "proficiency levels" every few levels, based on class, might be a good way of dealing with the vertical advancement vs horizontal advancement problem. And, heck, obtaining cross-class vertical advancement could still be done by spending some appropriate number of skill points. Interesting food for thought.

Blightedmarsh
2013-05-11, 02:51 PM
This is interesting. In the interest of making vertical advancement easy, what if Skill Focus was a skill trick that required Novice rank (or whatever analog we contrive) that essentially gave you the next ranks' bonus to d20 rolls for free when you gained the appropriate levels? This way, for characters who lack for skill points they can make sure that at least their d20 bonus keeps up with level even if they miss out on versatility because they can't afford as many skill tricks.

I like the concept that the base skill is kind of a root directory. Essentially hard to alter.

Riders would be things like skill focuses, skill tricks, specific bonuses and penalties. I also like the concept that X to Y would be listed under the riders.

In this way a Druid with a decent perception skill would be good at tracking (possibly using a knowledge:Nature rider) but not particularly good at reading people or particularly bad at appraising the worth of something.

Zovc
2013-05-11, 03:09 PM
My train of thought was leading me away from skill points, for the most part. I'm thinking it might be more elegant to do away with them in general. Though, depending on your school of thought, I could see someone representing that as 'a slippery slope towards 4th Edition' or something like that.

Without trying to toot my own horn, or whatever, I particularly like my idea of associating bonus skills with classes. It makes sense for every cleric to be proficient in Religion. It makes sense for every wizard to be proficient in Arcana. Maybe not every sorcerer (if there's an equivalent) is proficient in Arcana, though. Like you said, though, there's no particular reason for most skills to be cross class. So I could be a Cleric who is proficient in Religion, and through my back story (just being a level 1 character rather than being a cleric), I'm also good at History and Nature. You know?

I'm not saying it makes a huge difference, but tying specific skills to your class explains you having those skills, where as letting everyone pick X skills 'because they're level 1' almost pressures players into explaining why. "Because I'm a Cleric" doesn't work for being good at Tumbling. :P On the other hand, having Rogues get extra proficiencies in the skill(s) of their choice is kind of like, "You learn interesting things in my line of work."

All of that can be accomplished without skill points, it's just:
"Level 1 characters start with novice proficiency in (X + Intelligence modifier) skills of their choice; many character classes also grant proficiency with skills. If a class grants you a rank of proficiency in a skill you already have, you may instead choose a new skill to gain a rank proficiency you meet the prerequisites for in."

You don't need the abstraction of points, is what I'm trying to say, you simply have so many choices, and get so many more choices every so often. Or even, you automatically upgrade the skills you invested in every so often. That's why I suggested granting skill tricks with each rank, and being able to spend a 'floating resource' you're already intending to include in the game (feats) to augment the system you have in place.

Ziegander
2013-05-11, 03:35 PM
I like the concept that the base skill is kind of a root directory. Essentially hard to alter.

Riders would be things like skill focuses, skill tricks, specific bonuses and penalties. I also like the concept that X to Y would be listed under the riders.

In this way a Druid with a decent perception skill would be good at tracking (possibly using a knowledge:Nature rider) but not particularly good at reading people or particularly bad at appraising the worth of something.

Definitely on the same page, friend.


My train of thought was leading me away from skill points, for the most part. I'm thinking it might be more elegant to do away with them in general. Though, depending on your school of thought, I could see someone representing that as 'a slippery slope towards 4th Edition' or something like that.

Well, many, including myself, felt that 4e's system for skills was far too binary. Either you were trained and your bonus automatically increased with level, or you were not-trained and you just never used that skill. That and without skill points you leave Intelligence with nothing to do, which is no good, because then we're back to having a dump stat. So, keeping skill points helps me kill two birds with one stone. However...


Without trying to toot my own horn, or whatever, I particularly like my idea of associating bonus skills with classes. It makes sense for every cleric to be proficient in Religion. It makes sense for every wizard to be proficient in Arcana. Maybe not every sorcerer (if there's an equivalent) is proficient in Arcana, though. Like you said, though, there's no particular reason for most skills to be cross class. So I could be a Cleric who is proficient in Religion, and through my back story (just being a level 1 character rather than being a cleric), I'm also good at History and Nature. You know?

This all makes perfect sense. In D&D 3.5 characters gained proficiencies in certain types of weapons and armor at 1st level. What if, in this game, the class skill list functioned more like D&D 3.5's proficiencies, where upon taking the first level of said class you gain Novice rank in the listed skills? Moreover, those skills would automatically upgrade to the next rank every few levels in that class. No need to spend skill points on these, but they do need to be spent in order to buy the skill tricks for them or to buy cross-class ranks and skill tricks.

In this way you get your analog to "caster level" or "base attack bonus," but through the workings of a unified system (skills), nobody has to worry about vertical advancement for things important to their class, and we still get to make Intelligence do something important. If we increase the number of skill points that need to be invested in a skill to raise it a rank or to buy up skill tricks, then we can also keep Intelligence from getting out of control.


That's why I suggested granting skill tricks with each rank, and being able to spend a 'floating resource' you're already intending to include in the game (feats) to augment the system you have in place.

Well, I am planning on having something like d20's Feats in my game, but they'll probably be called something different and they might work much differently. I'm going to have to think about it. Skill Tricks really seem like they're going to occupy the same space that Feats used to, so another layer on top doesn't really feel needed at the moment. I was considering something like "Milestones" or "Achievements" at levels 3, 7, 11, 15, and 19 to round out the advancement by character level table, but those, seeing as there are so few, would have to be very different than d20's Feats.

eftexar
2013-05-11, 04:01 PM
It's possible I just missed the 5 ranks thing. I tend to skim more often than I should and joined this discussion midway through. Seems I was thinking on the same track with a lot of things then. I hadn't thought about the skill point tax though (but good point).

As far as my point on class individuality though is basically this: I wasn't calling the individuality of classes into question, but rather class chassis. I've got some broad skill based "archetypes" I'm thinking of:

Skill Monkey : have a broad range of skills - includes bard, rogue
Tacticians : focus on information gathering; ex. appraise, knowledge, and track - includes bard, sorcerer, wizard
Combat Technicians : focus on combat oriented skills; ex. bluff, tumble, escape artist - includes fighter, monk, rogue
Acrobats : focus on increasing mobility; balance, jump, and tumble - includes bard, monk, rogue
Social : focus on social interaction, ex. diplomacy, handle animal, intimidate - includes bard, cleric, druid, paladin


If every class has access to most of the skill(s) functions based on rank then the rogue is no longer the acrobatic skill monkey, the ranger loses it's ties to tracking and survival, and the sorcerer loses it's ties to tactics.

While I agree 3.5 went too far in restriction I worry if you don't reward classes for skills that define them you lose part of what makes them them.

And I hadn't meant all flat DCs should be eliminated. I guess I should rephrase. There are too many skills, such as tumble, that shouldn't be flat DCs because of how they interact with other characters. I can agree with reducing skill bonuses though, particularly with magic items and spells.

Honestly, I'd like to see parts of my system combined with yours. If you eliminate the skill points and just use the five ranks, use GeneralPatton's aid system, and then add in your idea of scaled failure and success we almost have a full skill system.

Other than that how did you decide to gain those 5 ranks? From what I see you plan to cap skills by level. I'm not sure I like that route, but I can see why you might want to do it that way.
Why not instead increase skills similarly to ability scores. Start with a base set and increase slower through leveling. I'm thinking something like this:

At character creation you select a number of skills based on each abilities' bonus to increase the rank of. For example, if you have a dexterity modifier of 3 you would select three dexterity based skills to increase one rank.

Then you could allow the player to increase a limited number skills, maybe equal to their intelligence bonus + the class skill points, that are class skills for their class skills to also increase in this way. Then at every even class level allow a single skill, from their class skills, by one rank.

The Skill Focus feat could allow you to improve the rank of any single skill, even if it isn't a class skill, to open up all skills, to all classes, to some extent.

Marcus Amakar
2013-05-11, 04:34 PM
A skill's rank grants the character a Competence Bonus to d20 rolls made relevant to that skill, but should also unlock new skill uses as well as a host of level-appropriate Skill Tricks. Skill Tricks might even include such things as maneuvers and even spells. I have ideas that would make it possible to include many different such subsystems within the Skills system allowing for great breadth and depth of player options when creating a character, regardless of class chosen. I'll get more into specifics when I get to talking about the actual Skill list.


I really like the idea of skill tricks providing some maneuvers and spells. I’d propose those more ‘ritual’ like spells. For example, Raise Dead could be a Master or Paragon level skill trick for those with Master/Paragon rank in both Knowledge (Religion) and Heal, while Plane Shift cold be for those with equivalent ranks in Knowledge (the planes) and Knowledge (Arcana). This way, parties without spell casters could remain viable at high levels, when such spells are essential.



I'd like to take this moment to suggest eliminating caster level from the game. Either it should all be based on character level, or the character's rank in some relevant skill such as Arcana or Religion. But maybe this is getting slightly ahead of ourselves.


I like this idea as well, as it means if the fighter takes 1 level in wizard at level 10 (and has the requisite skill ranks if it’s based on skill ranks), he’s not stuck with a 1d4 magic missile (not the best example) as some aspects of the spells have scaled.

General Patton
2013-05-11, 07:04 PM
Unless you allow someone with 5 skill ranks to take 20 on normal skill checks, once you get skill rank 5 this is always going to result in the person with higher skill attempting to aid the person with lower skill, so that he can then swap places with them and get the free 20. I doubt that's what you intended, but I don't see anything that prevents it.


That said, I do like the general intent here. Do you mind me cribbing some of it for my own skill system?

Oh, yeah that would be a problem. To fix that issue and bring down the complexity, how about this? 1 rank still limits your degrees of failure, because you are no longer subject to the Dunning-Kruger effect (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect) and can realize that you're not helping. 2 ranks lets you switch roles and take over the lion's share of the work if the other guy's performance is off. 3 ranks gets you the ability to Take 10. No other benefits beyond that should be necessary. If someone is only taking ranks to serve as backup and help the actual specialist, they probably won't go past 3 ranks. Any further than that and they are a specialist, whch is more than enough reward for the 4th and 5th ranks.

Go ahead and use it if you want.

Ninjadeadbeard
2013-05-11, 07:30 PM
My two copper on half-ranks: Don't do it. :smallsmile:

I prefer running skills like Pathfinder: Skill Points = Skill Ranks, capped at Character Level. Class Skills gain a +3 bonus so long as 1 skill point is invested in them.

Now I must return to lurking, as is my way.

Zovc
2013-05-11, 09:35 PM
This all makes perfect sense. In D&D 3.5 characters gained proficiencies in certain types of weapons and armor at 1st level. What if, in this game, the class skill list functioned more like D&D 3.5's proficiencies, where upon taking the first level of said class you gain Novice rank in the listed skills? Moreover, those skills would automatically upgrade to the next rank every few levels in that class. No need to spend skill points on these, but they do need to be spent in order to buy the skill tricks for them or to buy cross-class ranks and skill tricks.

In this way you get your analog to "caster level" or "base attack bonus," but through the workings of a unified system (skills), nobody has to worry about vertical advancement for things important to their class, and we still get to make Intelligence do something important. If we increase the number of skill points that need to be invested in a skill to raise it a rank or to buy up skill tricks, then we can also keep Intelligence from getting out of control.

The important thing I want to not here is that it sounds like you want to move away from CL and BAB being tied to class level, but rather to overall character level. I love this movement, because it makes multiclassing so much less punishing.

To me, it's equally important to pay attention to skills and class abilities in a similar manner. Perhaps not every class ability or skill should progress with your character's level, but it should scale with your character's level. Obviously, having a flat bonus to every d20 roll equal to half of your character's level makes progress towards this.

But, if characters automatically gain skill proficiencies at certain class levels, it's possible you want (or do not want) them to continue progressing with class levels versus character levels.

It'll ultimately boil down to how rewarding you want dabbling in classes to be. Systems usually tend to punish the jack of all trades (and it is smart to err on the side of caution), and that's fine. Just note (in case you had overlooked the fact) that making things scale by character level will always make multiclassing more rewarding than it was before. I like that, because I'm a cherry-picker, personally.

Reading back through your post and reflecting on it all, though, I think having classes provide appropriate skill ranks at appropriate levels (1, 5, etc...?) is a nice, flavorful reward for not jumping ship, and probably provides a good way of tailoring prestige classes to certain classes (if you're holding onto prestige classes :P).

Ziegander
2013-05-11, 09:39 PM
So, in the interest of keeping skill points around so Intelligence has a reason to exist (and to keep some granularity in the skills system), I've come up with a new proposal that combines some of my original idea with some of Eftexar's ideas and some of Zovc's ideas:

Using Skills
When making a skill check you roll a d20 and add the skill's associated ability modifier, the competence modifier provided by your ranks, and any other miscellaneous modifiers. Certain tasks require that you have a specified number of ranks in the skill before you may attempt them. Your maximum skill ranks in any particular skill are limited to your character level.

{table=head]Skill Rank|Competence Modifier


0|
-1


1-2|
+1


3-4|
+2


5-6|
+3


7-8|
+4


9-10|
+5


11-12|
+6


13-14|
+7


15-16|
+8


17-18|
+9


19-20|
+10

[/table]

In addition to granting a competence bonus to skill checks, increasing your rank in a particular skill grants your character access to skill tricks that you may purchase with your skill points. Every two ranks in any skill brings new and more powerful skill tricks to your disposal. These skill tricks give your character unique actions and options such as special attacks, movement, or even magical abilities.

Class Skills
Each class has a list of "class skills" that automatically increase. For every level you take in a given class each of that class' class skills increases by 1 rank. Though these class skills automatically gain ranks you do not automatically gain any skill tricks associated with the skills and must spend your skill points to buy those as normal. A skill trick associated with a class skill costs 2 skill points.

Cross-Class Skills
Any skill not on your current class' list of class skills is considered a "cross-class skill." You may increase your rank in a cross-class skill by spending skill points. If the skill has been a class skill for a previous class that you have taken levels in you may buy new ranks in it for 1 skill point (and skill tricks for such skills cost 3 skill points). If the skill has never been a class skill for any of your classes you must spend 2 skill points to buy a new rank (and skill tricks for such skills cost 4 skill points).

Zovc
2013-05-11, 09:53 PM
That's a fairly elegant way of tying everything together. I like it.

I am a little disappointed to see your simple, tiered proficiency system go, but it's still here in spirit. :)

Yitzi
2013-05-11, 10:21 PM
Well, the way I'm planning to design skill ranks something like this shouldn't be necessary. A single skill rank, or even four, wouldn't be worth what a feat is.

If so, then +3 without ranks would be even weaker, so those end up being overly weak feats.


That's essentially exactly how the game already works.

Not quite. Currently, you can take a level in wizard and spend 4 points on Spellcraft, then take a level in rogue and spend 5 points on Bluff, then go back to wizard for another 2 points in Spellcraft, and so on.


Well then perhaps characters should be able to save up skill points. There's really no reason not to spend them

Except that by multiclassing you can spend them on a class where it's not cross-class and therefore doesn't cost extra.

General Patton
2013-05-11, 10:34 PM
I too preferred the 5 tiers. It would make system mastery much easier if players could just visualize the new skill uses and the available skill tricks within a 5 row organizational construct.

Ziegander
2013-05-11, 11:03 PM
I too preferred the 5 tiers. It would make system mastery much easier if players could just visualize the new skill uses and the available skill tricks within a 5 row organizational construct.

Something that irked me about my previous 5-tier model was the sudden spikes in vertical and horizontal advancement made every few levels. Now, perhaps that's not a terrible thing as long as I could balance it out with powerful class features at the other levels, but I'm not sure I could do that consistently.

However, what if I replaced the table above with this:

{table=head]Skill Rank|Competence Modifier


0|
+0


1-4|
+2


5-8|
+4


9-12|
+6


13-16|
+8


17-20|
+10

[/table]

Ostensibly, it's much the same, however it provides a 5-tier model (rather than 10 breakpoints) and requires more investment into cross-class skills to reach the new tiers. It keeps the game design and also system mastery simpler because only 5 levels of skill tricks (powers under the name of any other system) are required instead of 10. It may, however, make other parts of the game a bit harder to balance. At least, I figure, it's a good alternate advancement schedule that can be playtested later if the one above doesn't feel right.

Another nice thing about this model is that I still have levels 3, 7, 11, 15, and 19 that are bereft of importance (at least before class levels are taken into consideration) which leaves me room to slot in that "Milestone" or "Achievement" stuff that I talked about earlier. These would be much more narrative-focused feat-like extras that add spice and power to your character based on things your character has done or experienced in-game.

Zovc
2013-05-11, 11:24 PM
10 tiers of skill tricks, specifically, sounds like a lot of legwork for every single skill.

It also will mean that level 20 characters have a cumbersome amount of options in addition to their class features. Especially if characters tend to have more than one skill trick per rank.

I do see where you're coming from with the longer interval between spikes in power levels. That is often how learning feels, though. For example, I've personally had a lot of concepts suddenly click when trying to learn them. Like singing and playing the guitar at the same time--one day I couldn't do it, the next day I was suddenly able to. lol

Blightedmarsh
2013-05-12, 01:40 AM
You could make individual skill points more important and far harder to acquire.

Each skill level opens up new skill tricks, new bonuses, new riders. Temporary bonuses to skill from spells or equipment simply grant the +X to the roll, they do not confer any further benefits or prerequisites.

Under this modal someone like a fighter would gain 1 class skill point and 1 floating skill point per level whereas a skill monkey would get two class and 1 or 2 floating skill points on alternating class levels.

Intelligence bonus (+DX) would determine how many points per level the character has to buy skill riders (skill tricks, +X to specific skill usages, X to Y attribute/skill for specific usages).

Zovc
2013-05-12, 03:41 PM
I feel like part of the reason skills leveling up in increments feels so funky is because you spend points on them, but only certain point thresholds matter.

When it comes to using a skill, thresholds do matter. There are many grades of skill. Between the thresholds, you've got people who are more reliably good than others. It represents the granularity between thresholds to have skill increments between them, but that's all those increments represent. I don't think they matter when we're trying to abstract and streamline things.

For example, let's say hiding in plain sight is something people who are especially skilled at hiding can accomplish. A novice can't do that, nor can a Journeyman, or even perhaps an Expert. But a Master might be able to, a Legend can. (I forget what your tiers were called, but from lowest to highest is assumed for my example.)

The masters who have been practicing longer than other masters will occasionally be more successful at hiding in plain sight, but it's still a demonstration of legendary skill.

Instead of having points which only serve to represent granularity between thresholds, why not let points do something exciting like buy skill tricks? Two Expert guitarists can probably play most of the same pieces, but they're really starting to develop their own signature and style on the guitar. Some Experts might be able to impersonate, I don't know, Dragonforce, while others can impersonate impressive classical guitarists X, Y, and Z. Knowing different skill tricks is a more worthwhile differentation between characters, and characters who are more apt to learn (AKA characters with higher Intelligence scores) will naturally have more skill tricks at their disposal.

tl;dr, Skill points and ranks seem ultimately pointless if you're trying to make the RNG less obtuse, and if you're going to represent proficiency in skills by tiers, you might as well not invest "ranks" into skills in addition to that. IMHO.

Ziegander
2013-05-12, 05:02 PM
Instead of having points which only serve to represent granularity between thresholds, why not let points do something exciting like buy skill tricks? Two Expert guitarists can probably play most of the same pieces, but they're really starting to develop their own signature and style on the guitar. Some Experts might be able to impersonate, I don't know, Dragonforce, while others can impersonate impressive classical guitarists X, Y, and Z. Knowing different skill tricks is a more worthwhile differentation between characters, and characters who are more apt to learn (AKA characters with higher Intelligence scores) will naturally have more skill tricks at their disposal.

tl;dr, Skill points and ranks seem ultimately pointless if you're trying to make the RNG less obtuse, and if you're going to represent proficiency in skills by tiers, you might as well not invest "ranks" into skills in addition to that. IMHO.

Don't worry, that's exactly what the plan is. Class skills automatically advance and skill points are only spent to buy skill tricks or to advance cross-class skills to the next tier. So, while those class skills are always at "max ranks" you must invest 4 skill points per rank in order to get your cross-class skills up to par. Seem good? "Ranks" might get a rename or something, but that's the plan. I think I'm going full steam ahead with that second table I put up and moving on to the next design stage. That is, so long as no one has any major objections. I think we've struck upon the best skill system we can get at this point.

As far as the next stage is concerned, I think I should actually get some of the environment/exploration mechanics hammered out before I get on designing the skill list and skill uses. I think this because it seems to me that knowing those rules will be important to providing quality skill uses and skill tricks for things such as acrobatics, athletics, perception, stealth, and other such skills.

Zovc
2013-05-12, 05:12 PM
So, while those class skills are always at "max ranks" you must invest 4 skill points per rank in order to get your cross-class skills up to par.

I think getting ranks/proficiency in class skills for free gives players enough incentive to "just" purchase skill tricks from their class skills. Having to spend the very resource I would be spending on skill tricks to give myself access to a skill that I like and I think fits my character concept seems like a steep enough cost to be able to purchase "cross-class" skill tricks.

I say however much a skill trick costs, that's how much the next tier of proficiency in a skill should cost. I'm basically giving up 1 "trick point" to learn a skill better (admittedly not the most exciting thing) and unlock new skill tricks (admittedly really cool). :)

Regarding moving on, I think this conversation is pretty thoroughly explored. I would not be opposed to reviewing it after it has more context from defined skills and/or an established environment and example adventures.

Ziegander
2013-05-12, 05:41 PM
I think getting ranks/proficiency in class skills for free gives players enough incentive to "just" purchase skill tricks from their class skills. Having to spend the very resource I would be spending on skill tricks to give myself access to a skill that I like and I think fits my character concept seems like a steep enough cost to be able to purchase "cross-class" skill tricks.

I say however much a skill trick costs, that's how much the next tier of proficiency in a skill should cost. I'm basically giving up 1 "trick point" to learn a skill better (admittedly not the most exciting thing) and unlock new skill tricks (admittedly really cool). :)

I'm thinking it should be playtested some definitely, but, for now anyway, the plan is to have class-skill skill tricks cost 2 skill points, while cross-class skill tricks cost 4 points. But I could certainly be persuaded to do elsewise. Thinking on it though, I just realized that, under the current rules, a cross-class skill can be obtained at "Novice tier" with just 1 skill point. So, perhaps I should edit the rules ever so slightly so that at levels 1, 5, 9, 13, and 17 class-skills automatically advance a tier, and so that cross-class skills cost 4 ranks per tier to advance. In that way, I could make the skill tricks all cost the same amount of skill points, whatever playtesting deemed appropriate.


Regarding moving on, I think this conversation is pretty thoroughly explored. I would not be opposed to reviewing it after it has more context from defined skills and/or an established environment and example adventures.

While there are still a few minor points that I think are worth mulling over, I tend to agree. We've got a pretty awesome model for the Aid action, courtesy of General Patton, and I think we've come up with a really great core for skill advancement and skill point investment. So, thanks a lot everyone, this has been a really awesome section to work through and design and discuss with all of you!

Speaking of moving forward, I had this to say about a consolidated skill list...

Speaking of a consolidated skill list, yes, I agree, I want a smaller set of skills with the aim that each skill is as important to players as the others. This is likely impossible to get perfect, but aiming for balance is best wherever possible.

Having said this...


...in the previous thread, I would like to stand by it and design the game in its entirety based around those principles. As such, while skills like Acrobatics and Athletics can make perfect sense in a game of just about any type, other skills such as Arcana only fit in certain types of games. So, what should the consolidated skill list look like?

... so, with that said, how would everyone feel about the following skill list:

Acrobatics (Agl), Athletics (Str), Bluff (Cha), Diplomacy (Cha), History (Int), Insight (Wis), Investigate (Int), Intimidate (Cha), Linguistics (Int), Melee Weapons (Dex), Nature (Wis), Perception (Wis), Ranged Weapons (Dex), Stealth (Agl), Streetwise (Wis), and Technology (Int)?


Insight would be a combination of Handle Animal, Ride, Sense Motive, Wild Empathy and other ancillary concepts. It could perhaps be renamed Cunning (I feel like I want to go back and call the ability score Wisdom instead)?

Investigate would be a combination of Gather Information, Search, and new tools to help a character be more of a detective. Tracking would fall under this as well.

Linguistics is stuff like Decipher Script, Speak Language, translation, etc.

Streetwise is kind of a combo of Knowledge (Architecture), Knowledge (Local), Knowledge (Nobility), and also things like haggling and possibly thievery/sleight of hand type stuff.

Technology would be handled as a catch-all that would vary by setting for craft/profession type things as well as Use Device and Disable Device and other things like that. All settings ostensibly have some form of technology even if it's just "hit rocks together to make fire." This is the skill used to handle that sort of stuff, all the way up to, "operate the helm of a starship."

eftexar
2013-05-12, 06:20 PM
I worry about this. I think you have consolidated the skills too much. Ride to me fits more in athletics and knowledge skills seem to bunched together. And Technology seems to broad.

If you have World of Darkness you should take a look at how it groups skills. I think it handled grouping them fairly well. It also had "sub-skills" where players could specialize in more specific functions. This could be a way of introducing a take 10 mechanic.

Give me a moment and I'll groups D&D skills in a similar pattern as nWoD.

General Patton
2013-05-12, 06:21 PM
How about, as a way of further differentiating characters, you actually spend your skill points directly on skill tricks and then reference the chart (respecting the level limit) to determine your bonus to the skill and whether you have access to the additional uses that everyone gets at certain ranks? A Fighter spends 2 points on the Novice Perception trick "Signs of Hostility" to get +2 Initiative and reduced Flatfooted penalties from watching muscle twitches and following the enemies' gaze, but the Rogue spends his 2 points on "Dying Breathless" to hear when enemies have exhaled completely so they can't scream when Sneak Attacked. Different tricks, but they both have 2 points for the purpose of bonus and default abilities.

In essence, instead of first buying vertical advancement, and then getting horizontal advancement after further investment, you only buy horizontal and the total of how much you've got tells you the vertical.

Zovc
2013-05-12, 07:02 PM
I'm still failing to see the purpose of skill points regarding vertical advancement in class skills. Why would a cleric not be as good at the Religion skill as he is experienced (his level)? Why does my cleric need to 'spend points' to do that? The reason I'm behind having "points" for skill tricks is because I think characters should be able to do diverse things with the skills they have. Anyways, I'm probably beating a dead horse--I've probably made my point clear enough already. We're supposed to be moving on!

--

I like General Patton's suggestions for "skill tricks" in that they are feat-like benefits rather than actions. They're also really cool. Perhaps this is your system's alternative to feats?

Regarding your consolidated skill list, I agree that things might be a little too consolidated. In a little bit, I'll look at your list with more scrutiny and try to think of things that don't obviously fit somewhere.

Ziegander
2013-05-12, 07:17 PM
I'm still failing to see the purpose of skill points regarding vertical advancement in class skills. Why would a cleric not be as good at the Religion skill as he is experienced (his level)?

But the Cleric is as good at Religion as he is "experienced." Religion would be a class skill for the Cleric and as such it would automatically advance vertically. The Fighter on the other hand becomes automatically more and more proficient with Melee and Ranged Weapons, but must spend skill points to become good with the Religion skill.


The reason I'm behind having "points" for skill tricks is because I think characters should be able to do diverse things with the skills they have.

And they will be able to. Skill points will serve to buy skill tricks and to buy higher levels of proficiency for cross-class skills. The class skills automatically rank up to higher levels of proficiency with gains in class level. I think your confusion might be stemming from the fact that I'm planning to allow 3e-style multiclassing which makes this all a bit more wonky but still very easily workable.


I like General Patton's suggestions for "skill tricks" in that they are feat-like benefits rather than actions. They're also really cool. Perhaps this is your system's alternative to feats?

General Patton's idea is an interesting one. It shifts skill usage in a very different direction than what I was planning, and ultimately I'm not as confident in the math of it as I am of the system I'm currently proposing, but it's a cool and fresh approach that I think deserves to be playtested in the future.

Also, yes, I think skill tricks are going to be my systems version of feats. I may end up calling them Talents or Powers or something else, but, yeah, my skill tricks and d20s feats seem to occupy very similar conceptual space.


Regarding your consolidated skill list, I agree that things might be a little too consolidated. In a little bit, I'll look at your list with more scrutiny and try to think of things that don't obviously fit somewhere.

Okay. Something I do want to avoid is having too many skills spread out so far that characters feel spread too thin. I want characters to feel like they've always got a good variety of options and having too many different skills can bleed characters of their skill points. I think 3.5 had too many skills in general.

eftexar
2013-05-12, 07:35 PM
Ziegander, what do you think of something like this for the skill list?

Acrobatics (Balance, Escape Artist, and Tumble)
Athletics (Climb, Jump, Swim)
Commerce (Appraise, Barter)
Craft (Glass, Metal, Wood)
Deception (Bluff, Disguise)
Empathy (Handle Animal, Persuade, Seduction)
Handle (Drive, Fly, Ride)
Investigate (Examine, Gather Information, Search)
Larceny (Disable Device, Open Lock, Sleight of Hand)
Linguistics (Decipher Script, Forgery, Speak Language)
Melee Combat (unarmed, magic, weapon)
Nature Sense (Geography, Herbology, Survival, Track, Zoology)
Occult (Arcana, the Planes, Spellcraft, Use Magic Device)
Ranged Combat (unarmed, magic, thrown weapon, projectile weapon)
Perception (Listen, Spot)
Perform; taken individually, some skills can be used in place of perform
Research (Find Information, Puzzle Solving)
Science (Alchemy, Architecture, Medicine)
Social Sciences (History, Nobility and Royalty, Religion)
Stealth (Hide, Move Silently, Tail)
Streetwise (Black Market, Local Knowledge, Sense Motive)
Technology (Computer Use, Engineering/Trapmaking, Programming/Hacking)
Unnerve (Intimidate, Interrogation)

Zovc
2013-05-12, 07:38 PM
Acrobatics and Athletics feel like they have a very awkward gray area. I totally feel the difference between them stylistically, but I don't know if it justifies separation. It is probably worthwhile having separate physical skills tied to strength and dexterity, though.

Again, I feel the difference between Insight and Investigate, but I'm wondering if it warrants separation.

Both of these can be shored up by clever and clear definitions, but I think we really need to examine the differences you want to have, and the similarities that create an "uncanny valley." A good first step, silly as it sounds, would be to use words that start with different letters. Not only is this going to make us have to get creative, but we are also likely to force ourselves to use more divergent words.

I feel like there should be some connection between Intimidate and Investigate (interrogation type stuff). Perhaps social skills could have skill tricks to assist Investigate checks?

Is Linguistics the "directory" for the old Diplomacy? Perhaps "Speechcraft", Diplomacy, or some other term would imply more than studying languages?

Streetwise seems like it's really encompassing, but I suppose it is all pretty interconnected in any given time period, and we just kind of take that for granted in this day and age.

Technology seems too broad, I agree. Not only is its name a little wonky to look at, but it really does everything. Perhaps a craftsmanship skill is in order? I feel like fine motor skills need their own category, and I feel like rogues should invest into it to be good at lock-picking and trap-dealing.

I wonder if Concentration needs to be represented at all. I was thinking it could be used for marching/making long treks in addition to keeping focus. A sort of "willpower" skill. Perhaps Constitution checks are good enough for that.

Regarding you wanting to change Cunning back to Wisdom, I like both words. I feel like cunning is a cooler word for it, but I also like the idea of every attribute starting with a different letter.

Oh! Regarding Melee Weapons and Ranged Weapons:
Archery, [Melee/Dueling/Swordsmanship/Martial Arts], and Warfare. And maybe Leadership.

I understand Archery and Melee being separated, believe me. I would advocate separating battle awareness and control into its own category for a few reasons. Tangent incoming:

I practice medieval combat fairly regularly. Used to be at least twice a week, lately it's only been once a week at best. Nevertheless, something I've learned fairly intimately is that skill as an individual fighter does not directly translate to fighting as a unit. As a matter of fact, in battles with teams, you can know as few as two or three attacks and kill all of your enemies with good teamwork.

Obviously, individual skill matters in combat, even in a large-scale battle. However, knowing how to position yourself to fight against multiple people and more importantly, how to position yourself to defend yourself (and your teammates) against multiple people is something you will never learn if you only practice dueling and sword techniques.

Every now and then, I'll go into battles unarmed (because I'm silly like that) and there's a running joke that I'm more scary when I'm unarmed than when I've got a weapon. Punches and kicks aren't legal, so it's not my Martial Arts or Melee Weapons anything like that that makes me so scary. It's because I am constantly threatening people with a grapple to the point where they can't forget about me. I'll act like I'm going to jump in on them in hopes of making them flinch. As soon as a person commits to defending themselves against me, they're open to my teammates. As soon as someone decides to pay attention to more well-equipped enemies, I'm grappling them and prying them open for a teammate.

Sure, what I described above is mostly flanking and teamwork, but it's combat prowess outside of Melee Weapons or Ranged Weapons. Maybe flanking how you want to represent that and be done with it, but I think it'd be interesting to have maneuvers dedicated to battlefield control that aren't directly tied to skill with a melee weapon or ranged weapon. :)

tl;dr, I tooted my horn in an attempt to advocate Warfare and/or Leadership as a skill in addition to Melee Weapons and Ranged Weapons.

General Patton
2013-05-12, 07:45 PM
General Patton's idea is an interesting one. It shifts skill usage in a very different direction than what I was planning, and ultimately I'm not as confident in the math of it as I am of the system I'm currently proposing, but it's a cool and fresh approach that I think deserves to be playtested in the future.

With regards to the math, you'd just use this slightly modified table.

{table=head]Level|Tricks Learned|Competence Modifier


N/A|
0|
+0


1-4|
1-2|
+2


5-8|
3-4|
+4


9-12|
5-6|
+6


13-16|
7-8|
+8


17-20|
9-10|
+10

[/table]

For class skills, you'd get to select tricks directly as you level instead of gaining ranks, and additional tricks would cost 1 point. Cross-class tricks would cost 2 points.

Though, now that I think about it, it might be simpler to just say that each skill trick you know increases your Competence bonus by +1, say that certain tasks require a certain Competence bonus to attempt them, and then cap the bonus at 1/2 level.

Ziegander
2013-05-12, 07:48 PM
I'm high on the awesome steak and potatoes me and my girlfriend made and ate for dinner, so my brain is unfortunately not functioning at anything resembling a reasonable level to reply to your suggestions at this time. I'll try and get back to you all tomorrow. :smallredface:

Seerow
2013-05-12, 08:07 PM
Ziegander, what do you think of something like this for the skill list?

Acrobatics (Balance, Escape Artist, and Tumble)
Athletics (Climb, Jump, Swim)
Commerce (Appraise, Barter)
Craft (Glass, Metal, Wood)
Deception (Bluff, Disguise)
Empathy (Handle Animal, Persuade, Seduction)
Handle (Drive, Fly, Ride)
Investigate (Examine, Gather Information, Search)
Larceny (Disable Device, Open Lock, Sleight of Hand)
Linguistics (Decipher Script, Forgery, Speak Language)
Melee Combat (unarmed, magic, weapon)
Nature Sense (Geography, Herbology, Survival, Track, Zoology)
Occult (Arcana, the Planes, Spellcraft, Use Magic Device)
Ranged Combat (unarmed, magic, thrown weapon, projectile weapon)
Perception (Listen, Spot)
Perform; taken individually, some skills can be used in place of perform
Research (Find Information, Puzzle Solving)
Science (Alchemy, Architecture, Medicine)
Social Sciences (History, Nobility and Royalty, Religion)
Stealth (Hide, Move Silently, Tail)
Streetwise (Black Market, Local Knowledge, Sense Motive)
Technology (Computer Use, Engineering/Trapmaking, Programming/Hacking)
Unnerve (Intimidate, Interrogation)

So I'm not sure if you intended this or not, but as I was reading your list, I was connecting it to how Shadowrun skills work, where you have your skill, and can specialize in the skill for an extra bonus in one area of it. (ie you get the skill Pilot Groundcraft, then you can specialize in Cars, Motorcycles, Hovercraft, whatever).

Following that, why not have D&D skill specialties? Let a character take Streetwise (Black Market), and have a bonus on rolls (and maybe a free skill trick or whatever) relating to the black market.

Just a thought.

eftexar
2013-05-12, 09:49 PM
Shadowrun must play similar to nWoD then. Because that is exactly how they do it. I just figured taking 10, in place of a flat bonus, for specialties would be an equivalent mechanic for d20.

But I hadn't thought of a free skill trick. That might be a handy way to give a minor option boost at the start. It would avoid the normal level dipping trouble with classes since it would eliminate the need for more class features at the start.

tarkisflux
2013-05-13, 01:06 PM
With regards to the math, you'd just use this slightly modified table.

[...]

I'm not sure that's the math that I'd be concerned about in such a change. A change like that opens up expected bonus and trick acquisition concerns that aren't present in the level based competence bonus setup.

The first weird case is the one where a person doesn't want to grab any tricks from a class skill for a few levels, because they're not interested or whatever. As a result, their bonus stays stagnant as their level goes up. That's not a bad thing on its own, but might be weird with other design priorities. It also prevents them from getting higher level tricks in the skill until they go back and pick some lower level things up because of the competence prereqs.

The second weird case is where they load up on lots and lots of tricks from a class skill. Assuming there are more than 2 tricks available per 4 character levels (which may not be a valid assumption, but seems a reasonable one), you can get a higher than expected competence bonus just by focusing in a class skill, which may also allow earlier than expected access to higher level abilities.

These are probably not all of the edge cases, and the problems are mostly solvable (level prereqs instead of bonus ones, cap on known tricks or bonus by level range, etc.), but the solutions I can see look either heavy handed or simply inelegant. I don't know that you gain a lot by making such a change.

General Patton
2013-05-13, 02:53 PM
level prereqs instead of bonus ones, cap on known tricks or bonus by level range, etc.

>implying the first column didn't denote a level-based cap on the bonus


The first weird case is the one where a person doesn't want to grab any tricks from a class skill for a few levels, because they're not interested or whatever. As a result, their bonus stays stagnant as their level goes up.

Not wanting to grab any tricks = impossibru. In my suggestion, the ranks you gain are essentially MADE OUT OF the skill tricks. There are no ranks without tricks. Being given free tricks for your class skills is equivalent to being given free ranks under the implementation that Ziegander is currently considering.


It also prevents them from getting higher level tricks in the skill until they go back and pick some lower level things up because of the competence prereqs.

Not sure what you mean. This is no different from being unable to take higher level tricks until you get the prerequisite number of ranks.


The second weird case is where they load up on lots and lots of tricks from a class skill. Assuming there are more than 2 tricks available per 4 character levels (which may not be a valid assumption, but seems a reasonable one), you can get a higher than expected competence bonus just by focusing in a class skill, which may also allow earlier than expected access to higher level abilities.

Level-based cap. If a level 4 Cleric gets 2 free tricks in Knowledge(Religion), allowing him to be at the highest bonus for his level (in accordance with Ziegander's plans for class skills to get max ranks for free), and he spends additional points on more tricks, he doesn't get a larger bonus. He'd continue to get free tricks as he leveled, and his bonus would update as the level-based cap was raised. If he decided to multiclass as something that didn't get Religion tricks for free as a class skill, then those extra tricks he bought would come in handy for staying at the max bonus. But no amount of extra tricks would let him meet a +6 Competence prereq until he was level 9.

Zovc
2013-05-13, 04:52 PM
So it occurred to me today how awesome it would be for specialist mages and/or Beguiler/Warmage/Dread Necromancer allegories to be able to pick up "foreign school" spells and abilities through the Arcana/Spellcraft/Magic skill.

Figured I should bring attention to it. I wouldn't necessarily encourage Necromancers who have given up Conjuration to pick up 'Conjuration' skill tricks, but it'd be good to let players know that they can if they want to. Alternatively, you can make this against the rules, but you will want to state that clearly.

tarkisflux
2013-05-13, 05:12 PM
Level-based cap. If a level 4 Cleric gets 2 free tricks in Knowledge(Religion), allowing him to be at the highest bonus for his level (in accordance with Ziegander's plans for class skills to get max ranks for free), and he spends additional points on more tricks, he doesn't get a larger bonus. He'd continue to get free tricks as he leveled, and his bonus would update as the level-based cap was raised. If he decided to multiclass as something that didn't get Religion tricks for free as a class skill, then those extra tricks he bought would come in handy for staying at the max bonus. But no amount of extra tricks would let him meet a +6 Competence prereq until he was level 9.

In my reply above I assumed the "pay for all tricks" model that Ziegander had previously proposed. I misread the line after the table about selecting free tricks directly and then buying extra ones, and thought you still intended for everyone to buy them at each level. Sorry about that.

Anyway, that's why I worried about people falling behind on selected tricks and bonuses if they elected to purchase lots of cross-class things instead. If the table should instead be read as "free tricks and competence bonus by level", then things are much more clear. You get some number of free tricks per level, can't have more than 2 free tricks per 4 character levels, and get your bonus boost every 4+ levels as soon as you put a trick in a skill. It sidesteps the concerns I had nicely and is rather elegant if you want people to have a minimum number of tricks at any given level as opposed to a minimum bonus at any given level (exactly how that tradeoff works out is subject to the free trick acquisition schedule and your ability to spread them around or not). With a reasonably large number of tricks per skill per level range (which seems pretty doable with a collapsed skill list) I could see it working extremely well.

Grinner
2013-05-14, 02:31 AM
So, I was just thinking. What do you all think is an optimal rate of success for player characters, and should the math be balanced around highly optimized/specialized characters or relatively "normal" ones?

Zovc
2013-05-14, 06:30 AM
So, I was just thinking. What do you all think is an optimal rate of success for player characters, and should the math be balanced around highly optimized/specialized characters or relatively "normal" ones?

Without using numbers because it's early (and I haven't had coffee in a long time):

I think specialists should regularly (50%+?) succeed challenges that are appropriate to their level.

The trick here, then, is figuring out how people grow and scale into challenges that are either outside of their specialty and more trivial, or how characters grow and scale into challenges that are above their levels--specialization or no.

PairO'Dice Lost
2013-05-14, 03:05 PM
So, I was just thinking. What do you all think is an optimal rate of success for player characters, and should the math be balanced around highly optimized/specialized characters or relatively "normal" ones?


I think specialists should regularly (50%+?) succeed challenges that are appropriate to their level.

I'd say in the 70% range, roughly, for specialists facing level-appropriate encounters. 4e is calibrated to have around a 50-55% chance if you don't optimize your primary attack numbers and 65-70% if you do, and people still complain that it feels like you miss your attacks too often if you don't go all-out grabbing bonuses. If the baseline is 70% for specialists so you don't have to work so hard to optimize your main schticks, and then most options help you bring up your secondary foci instead of boosting your primary focus off the RNG, that should give people a comfortable success rate.

Zovc
2013-05-15, 06:30 AM
That's fair enough. And you actually have some form of citation backing what you're bringing to the table. :)

While this doesn't change the framework of my statement, yours, or the conversation, I'd like to specify that when I used the word "challenge" I meant a challenge for a specialist. So, an especially difficult level-appropriate challenge, or a challenge for a higher tier of proficiency that can still be attempted.

Yitzi
2013-05-16, 10:27 PM
I'd say in the 70% range, roughly, for specialists facing level-appropriate encounters. 4e is calibrated to have around a 50-55% chance if you don't optimize your primary attack numbers and 65-70% if you do, and people still complain that it feels like you miss your attacks too often if you don't go all-out grabbing bonuses.

I think that some of it might just be a question of playstyle; some people prefer to always hit, whereas others (such as myself) feel that that makes rocket tag approaches too powerful and feel that if the attacker optimizes his attack to the same extent that the defender optimizes his defense then it should be around a 50% chance of missing.

nonsi
2013-05-18, 03:04 PM
I think I'm going full steam ahead with that second table I put up and moving on to the next design stage. That is, so long as no one has any major objections. I think we've struck upon the best skill system we can get at this point.

How do you plan to circumvent the fact that at least 1 rank out of 4 would be meaningless?
What I mean is that even if you make new tiers of skill tricks available at the even ranks, you'd still be left with ranks 3/7/11... granting nothing.

Btw, it seems unnecessary to me that all class skills are maximized, only the classes' key skills (arcana for mages, religion for priests, nature for druids/geomancers, sleight of hand etc). This by no means mean that a class should have exactly one skill auto-maximized, but there's definitely no reason to auto-advance all class skills.

Another thing I'm curious about is where (as in #at what level#) do you set the boundaries of human capabilities as far as skills go ? (remember that Jackie Chan is mortal, so kip-up & bounce-climbing two perpendicular walls should be within that realm).

One thing I strongly urge: Nuke the idea of multiplying 1st level skill points. Also, provide some kind of class-detached skill pool that everyone starts with. My sweet spot would be 4*4 for all races, with humans starting with 5*4 , but anything along those lines could be adequate with an appropriate equilibrium.

Vortalism
2014-09-25, 10:28 PM
I'm just wondering Ziegander, how are you going to choose to compile all these "streamlines" to the D20/D&D3.5 system?

Is it going to be something like a "Rise" RPG or a "d20 reborn" project or some compiled handout, because especially in your first and second threads you go on making some very big and fundamental changes in how the d20 system operates.

I'm very excited as to how all these ideas will manifest themselves as a final product.


As for the skill system itself, I think that having a linearly scaling numerical system works fine for the most part. The issue that I think you're addressing is with the DC or challenge system instead. What I do in my game is to leave the arbitrary skill rank numbers arbitrary but have a couple of tables for commonly used skills in differing brackets describe the possibility and sheer power someone with +21 in swim would have.

Instead of forcing the players to deal with skill-trick styled synergies and powers in the skill system, on the DM side I present to them a variety of options that are possible for them because they have that arbitrary number. Personally, I haven't done it in a way that's very measured by any means. However, I think that its a pretty attention efficient idea.

nonsi
2014-09-26, 08:12 AM
I'm just wondering Ziegander, how are you going to choose to compile all these "streamlines" to the D20/D&D3.5 system?

Is it going to be something like a "Rise" RPG or a "d20 reborn" project or some compiled handout, because especially in your first and second threads you go on making some very big and fundamental changes in how the d20 system operates.

I'm very excited as to how all these ideas will manifest themselves as a final product.


As for the skill system itself, I think that having a linearly scaling numerical system works fine for the most part. The issue that I think you're addressing is with the DC or challenge system instead. What I do in my game is to leave the arbitrary skill rank numbers arbitrary but have a couple of tables for commonly used skills in differing brackets describe the possibility and sheer power someone with +21 in swim would have.

Instead of forcing the players to deal with skill-trick styled synergies and powers in the skill system, on the DM side I present to them a variety of options that are possible for them because they have that arbitrary number. Personally, I haven't done it in a way that's very measured by any means. However, I think that its a pretty attention efficient idea.

My advice: Don't hold your breath. Just salvage whatever you can from this project.
Ziegander is a fountain of ideas, but he hasn't made an appearance since April and he doesn't complete the majority of his projects.
Furthermore, I don't remember him ever going back to a project he'd ditched.