Homebrew DesignRoll up your sleeves and get working: there's lots of homebrewin' to be done! Post your custom creation for critiques or review those of your peers.
Note: many of the ideas here are originally by Tarkisflus and the Tome of Prowess, merely reorganized by me. So, a big thanks to Tarkisflux! Special thanks also to Amechra, for helping to organize the maths.
Skills
Every character gains skill points from his class, which can be spent on any skill, giving a character ranks in that skill.
There is a maximum number of ranks that can be bought in any skill depending on level, equal to the medium progression.
However, character may also wish to specialize in a sub-area of a skill.
Specialization is a special skill trick (see below) that applies only to a certain, more specialized subset of a skill. You gain a bonus of +1 and another +1 for every five character levels in that skill area, effectively changing your skill rank bonus to that of the high progression if you spend full points on the skill.
Players are adviced to work with their DMs in finding relevant sub-areas for specialization that are neither too broad nor too general.
Example: Findelwald the Scholar is level 9, so he can have up to 9 ranks in any skill. His player has bought 9 ranks in Occult, spending 9 skill points. However, as the character is an expert on other planes of existence, he specializes in Occult (The Planes). This changes his bonus to that of the high progression of level 9, +12.
When rolling skill checks, a d20 is rolled and the skill ranks, any relevant modifier and the key ability named after each skill below.
All skills give special abilities that are listed further down, which are gained when a character
Note for third edition players: there are no class skills anymore. Everyone can buy whatever skills he wants.
Acrobatics Dexterity. This represents a character's ability to tumble past his enemies, fit into small spaces and perform other, similar feats of dextrous movement.
Animals Wisdom. This represents a character's ability to gain an animal's trust or train them, as well as his ability to care for them and ride them.
Athletics Strength. A character's ability to climb, run, swim, jump and perform other extraordinary physical feats.
Concentration Wisdom. A character's ability to ignore pain and distracting events around him.
Deception Charisma. A character's ability to deceive others by lying, feinting or disguising their mannerisms.
Devices Dexterity. A character's ability to manipulate, repair or jam delicate machinery or pick locks.
Expertise Intelligence. A character's knowledge about street culture, current events and politics, noteworthy locals and other such applies knowledge.
Heal Wisdom. A character's ability to care for the wounds and ailments of others.
Insight Wisdom. A character's ability to prevent being deceived, as well as recognizing the mental state of others.
Intimidation Charisma. A character's ability to bend others to their will.
Investigation Intelligence. A character's ability to find tiny clues and find necessary information.
Linguistics Intelligence. A character's ability in forging documents and finding forgeries, knowledge about ancient manuscript and obscure languages, learning new languges.
Lore Intelligence. Knowledge of religious customs, dogma and hierarchies, history, nobility and other ancient and current events.
Occult Intelligence. Knowledge about distant planes, rare creatures and magical occurences and rituals.
Perception Wisdom. The ability to notice small details, detect hidden enemies and react to them quickly.
Persuasion Charisma. The ability to convince others of one's viewpoint through words and to make deals.
Sleight of Hand Dexterity. The ability to pick pockets, perform small tricks of legerdemain, and move small objects around without being noticed.
Stealth: Dexterity: A character's ability to move silently and covertly without being noticed.
Survival Wisdom. Practial knowledge about navigation, foraging in the wilderness, tracking, findign shelter and other such wilderness abilities.
Advanced Skills:
Advanced skills are bonus abilities or new uses of a skill that a character gets for investing a certain number of ranks in a skill. As soon as they have invested that many skill points, that advanced skill is added to their list of abilities.
Skill Tricks:
Skill tricks are unique applications of skills, much like advanced skills, and like them, they have requirements. However, unlike those, they must be purchased at a price of one skill point.
Individual Skills:
Acrobatics: (Dexterity)
Spoiler
Basic uses:
Escape Grapple: The character may substitute an acrobatics check for your Combat Maneuver Bonus for the purposes of escaping a grapple. This action requires a standard action to perform.
Crawl quickly: a DC 15 acrobatics check allows a character to crawl at one-half his normal land speed as a move action, instead of one quarter his land speed.
Balance: a character can move over a narrow object such as a rope at one half their normal speed. The DC depends on the width of the object: between seven inches and a foot, the DC is 10. Between 2 and six inches, the DC is 15, and everything between 1 and 2 inches is DC 20. A slippery surface (such as from rain, ice or oil) increases the DC +5, while a surface that moves (a rope in the wind) increases it by another +2.
You are flat-footed while balancing.
Slip bonds: the character may escape ropes or other simple bindings by making an escape artist check opposed by ?*. This action requires one minute to perform.
Stand up: a DC 15 acrobatics check allows the character to stand up from being prone as a swift action instead of a move action.
Advanced Uses:
1 rank:
Move past opponent: the character can move through an opponent's threatened space without provoking an attack of opportunity by succeeding on an acrobatics check opposed by that enemy's CMB check.
Survive fall: a character can threat a fall as if it was shorter than it actually was for the purposes of falling damage by succeeding on an acrobatics check. A result of 20 treats the fall as if it was 10 feet shorter. Every ten points of success past 20 treates the falls as if being another ten feet shorter.
3 ranks:
Extremely tight space: a character can slip through a space narrower than their own shoulders, but wider than their head
Slip manacles: manacles and other complicated bonds (usually anything fit over a humanoid character's wrist, but smaller than the hand) can only be escaped by trained escape artists. This requires an acrobatics check of DC 30 or higher, depending on the manacles used. This action takes one minute to perform. Increasing the DC by five points allows it to be performed as a full-round action.
6 ranks
Agile running: if the character has six or more ranks in acrobatics, they retain their dexterity modifier to AC while using the run action.
Run up walls: running up walls requires the run action. The character must move at least twice their base land speed on normal, flat ground. Following this, they can run up to their land speed up any vertical or almost vertical surface, provided they end their movement on flat ground again.
7 ranks:
Balance on extremely narrow surface: the character can balance on any object, no matter how thin, as long as it can hold their weight, with a DC 30 acrobatics check.
9 ranks:
Squeeze through impossible space: the character can move through a space smaller than their head with a DC 40 acrobatics check.
Walk on liquid: the character can walk on liquids or similar surfaces that would not normally bear their weight, such as sheets of paper or brittle branches, with a DC 40 acrobatics check.
12 ranks:
Move through magical barriers: the character can move through walls of force, as well as any abjuration barrier that would normally stop them from walking through and allows spell resistance (such as an antiplant shell), witn acrobatics check of 20+the effect's caster level.
*We don't have an equivalent of Use Rope anymore. Did we ever say what that would be for tying someone up?
Animals
Spoiler
Basic Uses:
Befriend: You may use the animals skill just as you normally would hte persuasion skill, but on animals instead of intelligent creatures, to improve their attitude towards you or push them to an action they would not normally do voluntarily.
Riding: Usually, riding an animal requires no check, but requires one hand.
Guide with Knees: You can react instantly to guide your mount with your knees so that you can use both hands in combat. Make an Animals check DC 5 at the start of your turn. If you fail, you can use only one hand this round because you need to use the other to control your mount.
Stay in Saddle: You can react instantly to try to avoid falling when your mount rears or bolts unexpectedly or when you take damage. This usage is a DC 5 check that does not take an action.
Advanced uses:
1 rank:
Leap: You can get your mount to leap obstacles as part of its movement with a DC 15 animals check. Use your Animal modifier or the mount’s Acrobatics modifier, whichever is lower, to see how far the creature can jump. If you fail your animals check, you fall off the mount when it leaps and take the appropriate falling damage (at least 1d6 points). This usage does not take an action, but is part of the mount’s movement.
Spur Mount: You can spur your mount to greater speed with a move action. A successful Animals check DC 15 increases the mount’s speed by 10 feet for 1 round but deals 1 point of nonlethal damage to the creature. You can use this ability every round, but each consecutive round of additional speed deals twice as much damage to the mount as the previous round (2 points, 4 points, 8 points, and so on).
Control Mount in Battle: As a move action, you can attempt to control a lig mount not trained for combat riding while in battle with a dC 15 animals check. If you fail the Ride check, you can do nothing else in that round.
3 ranks:
Cover: with a DC 15 animals check and a move action, you may use your mount as cover while riding until the beginning of your next turn. This requires both your hands.
Fast Mount or Dismount: You can attempt to mount or dismount from a mount of up to one size category larger than yourself as a swift action and a DC 20 animals check, provided that you still have a move action available that round. If you fail the Animals check, mounting or dismounting is a move action. You can’t use fast mount or dismount on a mount more than one size category larger than yourself.
Mounted Combat: Once per round as an immediate action, when your mount is hit in combat, you may attempt an animals check to negate the hit. The hit is negated if your animals check result is greater than the opponent’s attack roll. (Essentially, the Ride check result becomes the mount’s Armor Class if it’s higher than the mount’s regular AC.)
6 ranks:
Attack from Cover: while using your mount as cover, you may have one hand free and use it to perform actions such as casting spells or attacking, if you succeed at a DC 20 ride check.
12 ranks:
Improved Attack from Cover: if you succeed on a DC 25 ride check you may use your mount as cover as a swift action instead of a move action, and you can have both hands free.
Athletics (Strength)
Spoiler
Untrained Uses:
Climb: You can climb up walls, which are, for purposes of climbing, defined as any incline steeper than about 60°. The DC for climbing depends the steepness of the surface, with further modifiers for circumstances. Apply all appropriate modifiers in order:
Steepness
DC
Slope
0
Hanging Rope
15
Vertical
20
Overhang
30
Handholds
Modifier
Knotted Rope*
-20
Rope*
-15
Ledges wide enough to stand on (Rigging, wall with windows)
-10
Hand- and footholds (tree, craggy rock)
-5
Perfectly smooth (polished metal, glass)
+15
Various
Modifier
Chimney (3 walls)
-10
Corner (2 walls)
-5
Slippery (Oil, rain, ice)
+5
*These modifiers apply only when the rope is in a position so that someone can brace themselves against a wall. They do not apply to climbing a hanging rope.
Jump: you may jump over or across obstacles. You may either make a high jump or a long jump. Jumping requires a move action to perform, and you may not jump further than your movement speed in one action (if you jump further, you complete your jump on your next turn).
With a high jump, you may reach a height equal to your body height plus one quarter your acrobatics check, in feet.
With a long jump, you reach a distance equal to one half your athletics check in feet. As part of a long jump, you may spend another move action to gain a running start. Your jumping distance increases another two feet for every five feet moved as part of that move action.
Advanced Uses:
1 rank:
Swim: Make an Athletics check once per round while you are in the water. Success means you may swim at up to one-half your speed (as a full-round action) or at one-quarter your speed (as a move action). If you fail by 4 or less, you make no progress through the water. If you fail by 5 or more, you go underwater.
If you are underwater, either because you failed an Athletics check or because you are swimming underwater intentionally, you must hold your breath. You can hold your breath for a number of rounds equal to twice your Constitution score plus ten, but only if you do nothing other than take move actions or free actions. If you take a standard action or a full-round action (such as making an attack), the remainder of the duration for which you can hold your breath is reduced by 1 round. (Effectively, a character in combat can hold his or her breath only half as long as normal.) After that period of time, you must make a DC 10 Constitution check every round to continue holding your breath. Each round, the DC for that check increases by 1. If you fail the Constitution check, you begin to drown.
The DC for the Athletics check depends on the water, as given on the table below.
Circumstance
DC
Calm Water
10
Rough Water
15
Stormy Water
20
Flood, hurricane or similar
30
Swimming against a strong current is especially difficult further halves your movement speed and gives you a -2 penalty on your athletics check. Having one hand full while swimming imposes a -1 penalty for a light object (anything about the size if your hand) or a -2 penalty for a larger or especially heavy object. These penalties double if both hands are full.
3 ranks:
Rapid running: you may run at five times your movement speed instead of four times when using the run action.
Hands-free climbing: you may have one hand free while climbing, to hold a tool such as a weapon (tools needed for climbing such as picks or ropes don't count). This gives you a -5 penalty on your climb check.
6 ranks:
Rapid swimming: you may move at one-half your movement speed as a move action, or your movement speed as a full-round action when swimming. This increases all swim DCs by 5.
9 ranks:
Improved Rapid swimming: you may move at your movement speed as a move action or double your movement speed as a full-round action when swimming. This increases all swim DCs by 10.
Concentration (Wisdom)
Spoiler
Basic Uses:
Concentrate: you can perform intense mental actions such as casting a spell, concentrating on a spell or using certian skills while being distracted by various external factors. If you fail your check, that action also fails.
Check: you only need to check for the same factor once, even if it goes on for a long time, or you repeat the same action many times during the same external disturbance. (Such as casting the same spell repeatedly during a storm).
Action: this check is made as a free action as part of another action, such as casting a spell.
Circumstance
DC
Loud noise, such as howling wind or nearby festivities
5
Rough Weather, such as high winds, sleet, strong rain
5
Motion, such on a horse, a speeding cart or ship in a storm
10
Harsh weather, such as hail, sandstorms
10
Violent Motion, such as a galloping horse or a small boat in rapids
15
Taking damage during the action
10+damage dealt
Other violent hostile action, such as being grappled
Opponent's CMB check.
Advanced uses:
1 Rank:
Ignore Painful wounds: you can ignore pain with a successful concentration check, temporarily negating all penalties to any checks or movement speeds. You still suffer all other effects of these effects might have.
This can include certain spells which deal enormous pain, which can be ignored with a successful concentration check against the save DC of the spell +5, or caltrops, which can be ignored with a successful DC 18 check.
A successful check as a free action at the beginning of your turn allows you to ignore the effects of pain for one round. You can repeat the check at the beginning of your next turn, but its DC is increased by +1 for every round after the first during which you attempt this. If you fail your check to ignore one instance of pain, you may not attempt to ignore it again.
Memorize: you can perfectly memorize long passages of text or numbers. A DC 15 check allows you to memorize an entire page worth of text as a full-round action.
6 ranks:
Ignore conditions: if you suffer from any of the conditions on the table below, you may ignore their effects for one round with a successful concentration check made as a free action at the beginning of your turn. The condition does not go away, and its effects return at the beginning of your next turn. You may try to make another check to ignore the same condition again during the next turn, but the concentration check DC increases by +1. If you fail your check against any effect, you may not try to save against it again.
The base DC for this is either 15, or the save DC of the spell or ability which imposed the effect on you in the first place.
You may ignore the following conditions:
Unsteady, Fatigued, Shaken, Impaired, Hindered, Stymied, Bloodied.
9 Ranks:
Ward off death: You may try to act normally while maimed or dying with a concentration check taken as a free action.
With a DC 25 check, you may act without taking damage while maimed.
With a DC 30 check, you may take your full competent of actions in a round while maimed, and avoid taking damage.
With a DC 30 check, you may try to take a single standard or move action per turn while dying. Doing so means you may not take a fortitude save to recover this turn, and take one point of damage.
Skill Tricks:
Spoiler
Agile Charge
Requirements: Acrobatics 6 ranks, Athletics 6 ranks
You may run or charge across difficult terrain, though doing so still slows you to half speed. Additionally, you may make a single turn of up to 90° during a charge or run action.
Breath Meditation
Requirements: Athletics 3 ranks, Concentration 3 ranks
You know a special kind of meditation that allows you to hold your breath for much longer times than normal. Effectively, you can now hold your breath for twice as longs as normal for your constitution score.
Dextrous Runner:
Requirements: Acrobatics 3 ranks, Athletics 3 ranks
You do not lose your dexterity modifier to armour class while running.
Meditation of Unending Air
Requirements: Athletics 5 ranks, Concentration 9 ranks, Breath Meditation
You can hold your time almost indefinitely by slowing your metabolism. Rounds during which you take no move, standards or full-round actions do not count towards the maximum amount of rounds you can hold your breath for.
Meditation of the Burning Soul
Requirements: Concentration 6 ranks
You can exist comfortably in cold conditions (between 0 and 40° Fahrenheit) without having to take any saves against the cold, and you gain a +5 competence bonus on all saves to avoid the effects of cold exposure.
Meditation of the Icy Soul
Requirements: Concentration 6 ranks
You can exist comfortably in hot conditions (between 90 and 110° Fahrenheit) without having to take any saves against the heat, and you gain a +5 competence bonus on all saves to avoid the effects of heat exposure.
Specialization
Requirements: at least 1 skill rank
You may buy a specialization in a subarea of any skill for which you have at least 1 rank. In that area, you gain a bonus of +1 and another +1 for every five character levels to your skill rank bonus.
Special: You may learn this skill trick more than once. Every time, you must specialize in a different topic, though you may specialize in the same skill more than once (e.g. you may have both Specialization (Occult: The Planes) and Specialization (Occult: Aberrations).
Wild Empathy:
Requirement: Animals 5 ranks
Animals naturally trust you. Their attitude towards you is improved by one step. (Normally from indifferent to friendly with wild animals, but hungry predators may improve from hostile to unfriendly).
“Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse,” I said, sounding calm, probably inaudible in the midst of the screaming. “Inevitable. Wasn’t that how she put it? I told them. Warned them.”
-Taylor Hebert. Yes, I'm a proud Skittle.
“Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse,” I said, sounding calm, probably inaudible in the midst of the screaming. “Inevitable. Wasn’t that how she put it? I told them. Warned them.”
-Taylor Hebert. Yes, I'm a proud Skittle.
Another skill, athletics, and two skill tricks which combine athletics and acrobatics. The run feat is now included in the athletics skill. Furthermore, I changed the formula for long jump checks. I hope it might be a bit easier, now.
Since we agreed that higher level skill checks should be superhuman, I'd love to hear some more suggestions for out-there skill applications for the movement skills. The ELH is a bit boring, here. Anything above level 10 is a bit empty, for now.
“Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse,” I said, sounding calm, probably inaudible in the midst of the screaming. “Inevitable. Wasn’t that how she put it? I told them. Warned them.”
-Taylor Hebert. Yes, I'm a proud Skittle.
a) Do we need both rank-unlocked advanced uses AND skill tricks?
b) Perhaps fewer levels of advanced uses would be easier- both for players to remember and for us to write.
__________________ STaRS-- The Simple Tabletop Roleplaying System; my attempt at a generic rules-light system.
“Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse,” I said, sounding calm, probably inaudible in the midst of the screaming. “Inevitable. Wasn’t that how she put it? I told them. Warned them.”
-Taylor Hebert. Yes, I'm a proud Skittle.
“Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse,” I said, sounding calm, probably inaudible in the midst of the screaming. “Inevitable. Wasn’t that how she put it? I told them. Warned them.”
-Taylor Hebert. Yes, I'm a proud Skittle.
So, a couple of things I wantedd to add in. First, you have a discrepency: Concentration is listed as being Wisdom-based in the description list, and as being Constitution-based in the skill description.
Second, also related to Concentration: might I recommend adding that Concentration covers meditation, and maybe some skill tricks that revolve around using meditation to ignore some penalties, such as fatigue (maybe a high Concentration roll allows you to only need to rest 4 hours instead of 8?)? That gives mundane characters access to "magical" abilties without them being magical, makes skills a tad more useful, and makes Concentration a bit more appealing as a skill for everybody.
Just a thought.
I enjoy reading about all the work you're doing. I'm making my own re-write, so I'm not sure if I'll ever use yours, but it is definitely well done, from what I can see!
I have been going in that direct with Concentration ,yes. It has absorbed most of Autohypnosis, for one example. Meditating should be in as well, and I'm always happy about hearing more suggestions for uses. I need especially high-level and pseudo-magical ones, for everything.
“Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse,” I said, sounding calm, probably inaudible in the midst of the screaming. “Inevitable. Wasn’t that how she put it? I told them. Warned them.”
-Taylor Hebert. Yes, I'm a proud Skittle.
“Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse,” I said, sounding calm, probably inaudible in the midst of the screaming. “Inevitable. Wasn’t that how she put it? I told them. Warned them.”
-Taylor Hebert. Yes, I'm a proud Skittle.
I appreciate the combining of skills. Well done! Altough, won't players have proportionally more skills points?
Why the removal of the first-level bonus? It does wonders to the randomness of the d20. What about doubling the ability-modifier? :)
The removal of craft and profession: why? I could see combining them into one (where the focus shifts between craft/profession depending on the specialization), or broadening them, but removing them entirely? What skill would a commoner 2 peasant have? What about the 4th level expert armourer?
What about spellcraft? Or Use magic device? What does a GM answer a player saying "I try to activate this scroll" ?
Why remove knowledge () totally, and not combine some of the superflous things and leave nobility for spezialisation? Isn't knowledge(x) easier to get an overview over than lore, expertise and occult?
Why the namechange search-investigation? Will there be a difference in application of the skill?
I am sure you guys had reasons for this, why not post them in spoilered posts? Same goes for having an overview over current choices in the G&G thread :)
On the other hand: I love skill tricks, love to see more of thos!
There was a lot of debate, and in the end, we combined a lot of skills. I wanted more, not less skills first, in the end we stole the idea of specializations from Shadowrun.
The first level bonus is still in. I should have linked medium progression here, I guess, but the medium progression starts at +3.
I agree about Craft and Profession, actually. I really think they should be in. As far as I know, the agreement in the G&G discussion thread and Skype chat was that we include "Backgrounds" separately, which give you things like profession and craft.
The various knowledge skills were combined into Lore (History, Religion, some parts of Geography, Nobility and so on), Expertise (Local, Nature, Gather Information, identifying Humanoids and so on) and Occult (the planes, Arcana, Dungeoneering). We all pretty much agreed that the written rules for identifying monsters are mostly useless and that we will probably replace them with 4E style entries on each monster. (I.e. Red Dragon: Lore 15: red dragons love both treasure and political power and often blablabla Lore 20: historical examples, well-known red dragons. Occult 15: red dragons are weak to bla and bla, their senses include X and Y. 20: they also have the following less-well known weaknesses and powers). That would work much better than simply basing it on HD, which have little to do with a creature's rarity. More specific knowledge is then a specialization such as Lore +5 (Nobility +7, the History of Startland +6) or Occult +3 (The Planes +4, Aberrations +4).
We simply thought that one skill for all knowledges wasn't enough, so we compromised on 3.
Investigation is not just search. It is what the Investigate Feat in Eberron tries to be as well. Looking for clues and knowing what to do with them.
UMD I didn't even think about. As far as I remember, we were talking about making that item specific, maybe just a charisma check to activate certain items. It's both too good and too specialized as a skill.
“Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse,” I said, sounding calm, probably inaudible in the midst of the screaming. “Inevitable. Wasn’t that how she put it? I told them. Warned them.”
-Taylor Hebert. Yes, I'm a proud Skittle.
I agree about Craft and Profession, actually. I really think they should be in. As far as I know, the agreement in the G&G discussion thread and Skype chat was that we include "Backgrounds" separately, which give you things like profession and craft.
I think the idea was that you could buy specializations in things like that, and other obscure-but-occasionally-character-relevant skills like Use Rope, starting at 0 and moving up to the poor progression.
Quote:
Investigation is not just search. It is what the Investigate Feat in Eberron tries to be as well. Looking for clues and knowing what to do with them.
UMD I didn't even think about. As far as I remember, we were talking about making that item specific, maybe just a charisma check to activate certain items. It's both too good and too specialized as a skill.
I think we said that it would be a class feature, as it's far too good to have as a skill period, much less an available-to-everyone skill. Occult might be usable as a stand-in, I suppose.
__________________ STaRS-- The Simple Tabletop Roleplaying System; my attempt at a generic rules-light system.
That sounds like a rather strange idea. I mean, specializations aren't any cheaper than other skills. That way, you are spending the same amount of resources you could spend on a broad skill on something incredibly specialized.
“Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse,” I said, sounding calm, probably inaudible in the midst of the screaming. “Inevitable. Wasn’t that how she put it? I told them. Warned them.”
-Taylor Hebert. Yes, I'm a proud Skittle.
That sounds like a rather strange idea. I mean, specializations aren't any cheaper than other skills. That way, you are spending the same amount of resources you could spend on a broad skill on something incredibly specialized.
I dunno. We could also add a profession skill, I suppose, to cover both craft and profession.
__________________ STaRS-- The Simple Tabletop Roleplaying System; my attempt at a generic rules-light system.
That sounds like a rather strange idea. I mean, specializations aren't any cheaper than other skills. That way, you are spending the same amount of resources you could spend on a broad skill on something incredibly specialized.
I dunno. My thought was that you wouldn't ever need/want more than a few ranks in craft/profession, and it wouldn't need skill tricks, so it wasn't worth a full skill. You could have a specialty in smithing, say, or sailing.
I suppose we could also add a some sort of general skill to cover craft, profession, and perform.
__________________ STaRS-- The Simple Tabletop Roleplaying System; my attempt at a generic rules-light system.
We probably should. I mean, I don't know about you, but in most parties I run, I have at least one master bard, or legendary blacksmith or famous engineer or something.
It has been suggested that we split Persuasion in a "Making friends" and a "making deals" skill. The Making Friends skill could cover Courtly Manners, at least. Which includes some dancing.
“Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse,” I said, sounding calm, probably inaudible in the midst of the screaming. “Inevitable. Wasn’t that how she put it? I told them. Warned them.”
-Taylor Hebert. Yes, I'm a proud Skittle.
"Making friends"-skill? I shudder a little and think back at the 3rd edition diplomacy... What about a sozialise-skill that let's you talk your way out of stuff, gather information and the like? People-skills! (Bad pun is bad!) Or perhaps the border between persuasuion and sozialise would be too vague.
I like the idea of a PC craftsman, to craft magic items and stuff. I also think it would be too broud to have every profession covered by one skill. Perhaps a profession(something) where something is really broad? (Most smiths you'll meet probably has bougth every spezialisation for ranks. May be an explanation of where the rest of a blacksmiths ranks go!).
It's refreshing to see the reasoning behind the choises made (as everyone will compare the skillsystem to 3.5 or smth). Why not include the reasoning in the post?
What are the medium and poor progressions you talk about?
So, activation of magic items is kept as a class feature, but the extreme amounts of 3.5 items still exist? Wouldn't this make a very sharp difference between those that have and those that don't?
How deep are you guys going in the update of 3rd ed? Are you rewriting everything? Classes? Monsters? Spells?
Concerning knowledge and monsters: that's just correct! And the way I've been playing, I even think some of the MM's use that format. Perhaås a system that gives out a (large) bonus for preparing to meet the monster and finding out about it before seeing it in the dungeon could be in order? I find it a bit weird that it is allright to just waltz in and suddenly know a lot about the monster, some research and time to think is usually needed in order to find out something about something.
Awesome! That simplifies things, altough I almost could feel cheated as a cha-monkey with int as an allright stat not to be able to use cha to gather info.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Grod_The_Giant
Mmm. Look OK so far, but...
a) Do we need both rank-unlocked advanced uses AND skill tricks?
b) Perhaps fewer levels of advanced uses would be easier- both for players to remember and for us to write.
What about dropping the advanced uses completely? What about skill tricks with rank prereq.s? And then let a skill trick be the "magical" uses of a skill not possible in the real world, like jumping out of our dimension or tumbling trough a magical barrier.
Usually, when you get at higher levels, skill bonues starts to get ridiccoulus. People routinely beat the crap out of the PHB DC's, and start to amass huge bonuses. If we could route some skill points over to skill tricks, then we get a good reason for skills to get past human possibility, and flatten out the progression of skill bonuses at the same time! As an added bonus, non-magic-dude gets more to do.
I dunno. My thought was that you wouldn't ever need/want more than a few ranks in craft/profession, and it wouldn't need skill tricks, so it wasn't worth a full skill. You could have a specialty in smithing, say, or sailing.
I suppose we could also add a some sort of general skill to cover craft, profession, and perform.
A player in a campaign of mine has almost maxed out profession(sailor). I'm still suprised of the session where they needed to face the BBEG in orderto avoid the streams. He just navigated trough, and forced the BBEG to march on them. At higher levels I suppose you could use it for safe travel when normally enemies would magically mess with other means of travel.
I've been meaning to talk about specializations for a while now, sorry this is a bit late. I think they have a value problem. For the same cost as a +1 specialization, you can get a new skill trick. Or a rank that opens up new regular abilities and boosts all of your checks with the skill. I think that buying a flat +3 specialization for 1 skill point is a better call. Turn each +3 specialization into a skill trick you can take over and over again basically. It keeps you from having to track different specialization investments on top of skill and trick investments, and seems to me about as likely to come up on average about as often as any skill trick.
If you want craft, perform, profession, and the like to stay in the skill system instead of moving to a new background system, may I suggest that you also treat those like skill tricks? Spend 1 point, get "craft <whatever>", and have a bonus to your roll that is either fixed or scales with level (depending on how checks with it work). That way you don't have to worry about making a full investment in craft or profession worth as much as a full investment in acrobatics that lets you attempt to slip through walls of force and walk on water.
__________________
Bouncy ball is the source of all goodness and light!
I prefer higher powered games, do not consider magic to be "special", and want non-casters to have similar levels of utility. If you haven't clearly said what your balance goals are, my suggestions generally reflect that. I'm pretty good with other balance points too though, so if I'm offering OP advice, let me know and I'll fix that.
Hm. Craft and performance could well be a series of skill tricks. Like, maybe three. Performer, Master Performer, Legendary Performer. The first is making a bit of money and looking good, the second is a major bonus on charisma skills if done right and may open up other things, the third does all the weird stuff like attract extraplanar entitites or get you sponsored by muses.
Specialization would make a good skill trick, I think. Maybe a scaling bonus? 1 +1/5 levels should turn out the same as the progression. Or just call it "that area of hte skill is upgraded to the good progression".
“Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse,” I said, sounding calm, probably inaudible in the midst of the screaming. “Inevitable. Wasn’t that how she put it? I told them. Warned them.”
-Taylor Hebert. Yes, I'm a proud Skittle.
Scaling bonus is fine, but it starts weaker and ends stronger. Which is fine if that's what you want, but it does potentially weird things to "expected success rate with new skill abilities" when you get late abilities.
I also meant to talk about that progression too, (or a 1, +1 per 4 levels over 1 progression which is pretty similar), and then forgot. So thanks for reminding me! Based on defense scaling discussion in the combat thread, you're probably going to want that progression written up anyway (in the combat thread, it would be the Def bonus for people with the poor BAB progression). Since you need it anyway, you could do that for the specialization instead of the "upgrade to good" setup (though it's basically the same thing), and you could also use that in place of the 0 advencement track for skills that people don't invest in.
__________________
Bouncy ball is the source of all goodness and light!
I prefer higher powered games, do not consider magic to be "special", and want non-casters to have similar levels of utility. If you haven't clearly said what your balance goals are, my suggestions generally reflect that. I'm pretty good with other balance points too though, so if I'm offering OP advice, let me know and I'll fix that.
“Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse,” I said, sounding calm, probably inaudible in the midst of the screaming. “Inevitable. Wasn’t that how she put it? I told them. Warned them.”
-Taylor Hebert. Yes, I'm a proud Skittle.
I changed the wording on Specialization and added it as a skill trick. Wording okay?
Mmm. I'd go with "pick one subset of one skill you have at least one rank in, such as Athletics: Climbing. You gain a +3 bonus to checks made in that subset. This bonus increases by 1 at 5th level, and at every subsequent 5th level, to a maximum of +7 at 20th level."
(Starting at +3 makes it a scaling version of the Skill Focus feat. You can drop it to +1 if you want, but that makes it a lot less appealing, methinks. It's a narrow enough bonus that we can be generous)
__________________ STaRS-- The Simple Tabletop Roleplaying System; my attempt at a generic rules-light system.
“Not a promise, not an oath, or a malediction or a curse,” I said, sounding calm, probably inaudible in the midst of the screaming. “Inevitable. Wasn’t that how she put it? I told them. Warned them.”
-Taylor Hebert. Yes, I'm a proud Skittle.
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