Now, before anyone gets their nuts in a knot, I'm not just going to start handing out skill points (and jeez, anyone who has played in one of my campaigns ought to know I don't just hand stuff out).
First of all, I think the skill point system is one of the best innovations in D&D 3.x- and for those of us who played AD&D, or old Basic or 1st Edition, it is an innovation. Back in the day, you had non-weapon proficiencies and you liked them. And you were just as good a basketweaver, or tracker, or leatherworker, or firebuilder (yes, there was a proficiency for firebuilding) at 1st level as you were at 43rd. Remind me why we ever thought AD&D was a good system?
But let's look at this from the inside, with my favorite class and yours, the Ranger. Let's call him Bob.
Bob is a half-elf with, we'll say, an above average intelligence of 12. This gives him a +1 bonus to skill points. As a ranger, he starts with 6x4; add to this his Int. bonus and this means, basically, Bob gets to pick seven skills if he wants to max them out. Bob should max out his skills, because he wants to be useful to the party beyond 1st level; spread those skill points out too much and he won't actually be good enough at any of his chosen skills to succeed at any checks.
So what skills should Bob take? He gets seven choices; he has seventeen class skills to choose from. Let's say Bob wants to be a real "nature-y" ranger. Here are the skills he definitely ought to take:
Survival (a no brainer- a ranger pretty much has to have this)
Knowledge, Nature- (I've never been too clear on why this isn't covered by Survival, but I suppose there are arguments to be made that they are separate skills)
Knowledge, Geography (Bob is a traveler, after all)
Handle Animal (if Bob ever wants to train his animal companion)
That's 4 skills gone; Bob wants to take advantage of the Ranger's ability to hide and move silently, so
Hide
Move Silently
That's 6. He gets one more pick. He doesn't want to be easily snuck up on, so he can take Listen or Spot. One or the other, if he wants to max it out. Say he splits 'em up, since he's a half-elf, and he gets a +2 to spot and listen anyway, that ameliorates it somewhat. I strongly advise not splitting skills up, but there you go. Now, let's look at all the things Bob the Ranger can't do;
Climb, Jump, Use Rope, Swim, Know about Dungeons (Dungeoneering) , Search, Heal, or Ride.
Sure, he can try to do them, but he has no expertise in any of them. A ranger that can't climb, jump, or swim is kind of a lame ranger, isn't he? I mean, isn't that part and parcel of the ranger archetype; Aragorn, Hawkeye from Last of the Mohicans, Drizzt Do'Urden- they could Climb, or Swim, or Use Rope, right?
Let's say Bob even has a super Int, 18. That gets him 3 more skills to pick from. Say he takes Climb, Jump, and Swim, to complete his vision of what a ranger ought to be. Fine, that seems more or less complete.
Here's the point I'm getting to; shouldn't a Ranger be able to track stuff (Survival) move undetected in the wilderness (Hide, Move Silently) be aware of his surroundings (Spot, Listen) overcome natural obstacles (Jump, Climb, Swim) know what animal/monster is what (Knowledge: Nature), know where in the world he is (Knowledge: Geography) and maybe have another skill or two for color&personality (Craft: Leatherworking or Bowyer- making him more self-sufficient, or Use Rope or Profession Sailor). So, even if you exclude the "color" skills that's 11 skills that a Ranger probably should have: Survival, Spot, Listen, Hide, Move Silently, Knowledge: Nature&Geography, Jump, Climb, and Swim.
The only ranger that's able to effectively get all those skills at 1st level is a human with an 18 Intelligence. I'm all for concepts and RP, but unless I rolled God's own stats, I'm not going to put an 18 into Intelligence when I'm creating a Ranger. A Rogue, maybe...but not a Ranger.
Speaking of Rogues, let's take a look at them. The ultimate D&D skill user, right? Okay, say you want to make the typical guild thief Rogue. A staple of D&D games and fantasy literature since time immemorial. Or, at least, since Fritz Leiber.
So, you want to be a guild rogue. You're a halfling. You have 8 Skill Points, an Intelligence of 14, letting you pick 10 skills to max out. You've simply got to have the following: Hide, Move Silently, Search, Disable Device, Open Lock, Sleight of Hand, Climb, Spot, and Listen. That's 9. Want to know what your plunder is worth? Take Appraise. Aaaaaand you're done. You can't talk your way out of trouble. You can't use Decipher Script (and you're one of only 2 classes that can take it in the first place), you don't know much about your city (no Knowledge: Local or Gather Info) Use Rope, break out of the hoosegow (Escape Artist) you can't duck and dive in combat (Tumble)...it goes on.
Now, it's hard to make a case that a Rogue doesn't get enough skills, but I think the point remains; the archetypal things we expect a certain kind of rogue to be able to do are beyond the reach of the average rogue. Or even the above average rogue, usually. Is this appropriate for a game of heroic fantasy?
So, how does this work out for other classes? Rather less well. Many of them don't necessarily need lots of skills, but the thing is, skills are one of the quantifiable ways D&D offers, a system, to really customize your character and add depth, personality, color, and backstory. Maybe your Sorceror was an apprentice Bowyer when he accidentally incinerated the bowstave he was working on, which set him off to try and discover something about himself, and this led him to a life of adventuring. So you want to put ranks into Craft: Bowyer and keep up with the skill; make bows for the party, or to pick up some extra cash. Why not? It adds color and personality and depth; all the things skills can do.So, you want to be a guild rogue. You're a halfling. You have 8 Skill Points, an Intelligence of 14, letting you pick 10 skills to max out. You've simply got to have the following: Hide, Move Silently, Search, Disable Device, Open Lock, Sleight of Hand, Climb, Spot, and Listen. That's 9. Want to know what your plunder is worth? Take Appraise. Aaaaaand you're done. You can't talk your way out of trouble. You can't use Decipher Script (and you're one of only 2 classes that can take it in the first place), you don't know much about your city (no Knowledge: Local or Gather Info) Use Rope, break out of the hoosegow (Escape Artist) you can't duck and dive in combat (Tumble)...it goes on.
Now, it's hard to make a case that a Rogue doesn't get enough skills, but I think the point remains; the archetypal things we expect a certain kind of rogue to be able to do are beyond the reach of the average rogue. Or even the above average rogue, usually. Is this appropriate for a game of heroic fantasy?
But a Sorceror gets 2 skill points, plus his Int. Say you're a human. As a Sorceror, you probably don't have a stellar intelligence; maybe a 12? That'll give you 4 skill points if you're maxing out. As a spellcaster, you've got to have Concentration and Spellcraft, and probably Knowledge: Arcana. So then you can take your skill for color, background, and depth, or you can take Bluff (why do Sorcerors get Bluff and not Diplomacy or Gather Information or Intimidate or any of the other Charisma-based skills?) or Craft: Alchemy, which might be more advantageous for you.
Now, I don't want to just derail into bitching about how D&D doesn't support roleplay. As long as I'm GMing (God willing, a long time) there will be roleplay at the table. I'm not so worried about that, really. I'm worried about giving the characters a fair shake and making sure their character matches their vision. What's great about the skill system in 3.x is the widespread customization it gives you, not only in min-maxxing terms, but in character development terms (which should be at least as important).
So, what to do? Is the skill system completely fine? Should I stop my bitching? Bump up every class's number of skill points by 1 or 2? Should there be fewer skills? I mean, you can easily make a case for lumping Climb, Balance, and Jump into one skillset, and perhaps the same with Bluff, Diplomacy, and Intimidate, or Listen and Spot. And sure, there are feats you can take to add to certain skills- but who is going to waste a feat on skills when you can do much cooler things with them?
So, enough of my yakkin'. Comments away.
7 comments:
This post surprised me greatly.
First of all, you use as your baseline for archetype heroes the paramount guys in their class. Aragorn would be epic level for f's sake.
I can certainly understand how you want a character to be able to be awesome at everything, but if you're starting at level one that ain't gonna happen. That's sort of the point of starting at a low level, you get better at all this stuff. You get skill points every level after all.
The skill system is basically the last thing I would say is "broken" in D&D (I wouldn't really say anything is "broken" in D&D, just some of it is slightly dubious). If you want more skill points to dole out, kill yourself some kobolds and level up you pansy. It's not like you can't just default to the base attribute anyway.
And if everyone really wants to play immediately powerful heroes start with higher level characters. Then you're not forced to make these difficult choices.
Ok, where did I say I wanted characters to be awesome at everything?
Nowhere, that's where.
Secondly, I used Aragorn (or Hawkeye, or the Grey Mouser) as the archetypes that characters might aspire to, who they might want to model their skill-set off. Not as who they should be at 1st level.
And jeez, start at higher than 1st level? Who do I look like, Craig?
My point is not that characters should be awesome at first level, my point is that maybe the skill system, which does seem well-made, isn't as great as I used to think. No character should be great at everything. But unless you have super-elite stats, or you break your skill ranks up and don't max skills out (and you should max skills out, otherwise they turn useless, fast) a character is not going to be able to do the things it feels like a ranger ought to have some skill in.
I think my real problems are with the physical skills; Climb, Jump, Swim- seems like nobody ever takes these skills, and yet a ranger SHOULD be able to Climb, Jump, and Swim, right? A guild-thief ought to be able to Climb and Balance for those second-storey jobs, yes? And yet it's almost certain that most 1st level rangers or rogues- the most skill-usin' classes in the game- aren't going to be able to do that. Not if they want to do much of anything else. The rogue will, naturally, be able to do other things, but the ranger, that'd be half his skill allotment.
Sure sometimes at later levels you can stop adding once you can make all the checks. But what do you do when nobody in the party can Swim, 'cause nobody put ranks in, and you place ONE encounter where Swimming is necessary, and you get a TPK because everyone futilely drowns, because even though they stripped off their armor, they rolled a 2, add their strength (2) an action point (4) got an 8 and gluglugluglugluglug DEATH.
The point is interesting, for sure. But RPGs are supposed to be about choices, and if a PC wants his guy to be good at Swimming, then he should put a few points in. Alternatively there is gear to allow you to do that.
However, I do think you make a good point that perhaps a) there are too many skills and b) perhaps possibly not enough skill points to go around for everything.
However, I would argue that good games, D&D included, are about choices. If the PCs are shitty swimmers, they should try to find another way around the problem. That's why druids have water breathing and mages have fly spells, etc.
I'm going to sound like a broken record, but we have run into issues in Burning Empires very similar to yours, and the system handled it flawlessly.
Chuck's character wanted to sneak quietly to a meeting. Sneaking like this requires the Infiltration skill. Chuck didn't have it. The way BE works in that situation is you use the base stat instead and double the Obstacle.
The great thing about this though is Chuck also earns a test for Infiltration. Per the advancement rules, he needs a number of tests equal to 10 minus his base stat to earn the skill. So if Chuck keeps trying to Infiltrate, even if he doesn't have the skill (and even if he fails miserably at it for a bit), his character will eventually learn the skill!
Dan, you say you are not willing to hand things out at a table, huh? You handed me keys to a brand new crypt just about every week!!!
I see both Yeager and Dan's points. It is hard to customize characters to your vision, however sometimes hard decisions have to be made in week 1. The thing that I always saw as odd was Joe Wizard didn't actually have to use his knowledge of the arcane to increase his skill, he just had to go hit a kobold with his staff.
There very well may be too many skills in D&D, and synergy bonuses try to alleviate that, but honestly it's a cute attempt at best. Their flaw is that you still have to spend a decent amount of points in a skill to get a bonus to another and most of the time they are situational bonuses.
I enjoy the fact that in BE, there is a mechanic to directly reward the use of a skill, even in failure, with advancement.
Here's basically how it works for those not familiar with it. When you use a skill, which range in value from 1 to 10, you earn "tests" of that skill which range from "routine" to "challenging" based on the amount of dice you roll vs. the difficulty of the task. At the earlier stages, a few routine tests will help you raise your skill level. As you progress, however, routine tests won't count towards your progress. It's like the real life version of say, the "baseball" skill. When you're learning, you can stand in your back yard and sock dingers off a tee ball stand. However, after a while, in order to get better, you need circa 90s Randy Johnson winging dove-busting fastballs inches from your groin.
If there are skills you don't know, you can learn them by attempting them as Yeager said above. You test the skill untrained until you get a set number of tests in it, then the skill is open to you for advancement.
Maybe D&D needs to stop giving skill points out per level? Maybe it would be "more accurate" to just assign skill points at level 1, to open skills up, have a few skills "automatically available" to certain classes (open lock for rogues, knowledge arcana for mages) and the rest open to everyone? Then as you level, you gain points in the skill as you use and test them? Maybe offer bonus skill points to the classes who need them like rogues or bards? What we need are more tables!!!
I think this could all be handled with (yet) another supplement.
as an AD&D old-timer, i need to ring in here.
i've thought a lot about skills (and feats) in 3.5e and i have a number of things that i'm disappointed in, unfortunately. i think the emphasis has been poorly placed on gaining skill points; many of the associated actions can be performed *without* adding ranks and i think that gets lost in the current system. i say:
1) make it easier to perform almost any of the actions with zero ranks;
2) class skills automatically should be treated as *ranked* skills (i.e. 1/2 rank);
3) adding ranks represents significant training/effort spent honing that ability.
beyond the first level, i like this idea of gaining skills through use and abuse rather than through arbitrary point allotment. how many PCs minmax skills based on achieving the desired prestige class but never actually use said skills? i'm not well-versed enough yet in 3.5e so i can't pull an example out, but i'm sure we all see the potential.
providing or allowing the use of skill points as a result of attempts makes sense AND rewards role-playing. as sol in dan's current campaign, i didn't think to take ranks in rope-use, swim, or intimidate. while the first two are gimmes for almost any campaign, the third is evolving from use and RPing. while only 87lbs of elf, sol will definitely be intimidating foes throughout his adventuring career. and, somehow or another, he will get better at it.
(who needs a supplement to dictate what can be done?! the AD&D in me says 'house rules'!)
This looks like a bit of an old post, but I wanted to add my two cents.
First, I definitely agree that the number of different skills is too high for the amount of skill points given out. Spot and Listen in particular - why can a Barbarian be great at listening, but not so good at spotting? They're both the same task, just different senses, so it doesn't seem to add very much to divide them out, other than to force roguey-types to spend more effort to the "living detectors".
However, I disagree completely with your assessment of the ranger who can't swim. First, it's perfectly reasonable that a ranger wouldn't be able to swim "better than the average human". Not every hunter or naturalist is an athlete. Second, a ranger would be better than the average PC, rank-for-rank, because a ranger will typically have a high strength and low "carried weight" penalty. On the other side, the tanking fighter/paladin/cleric, with all of his heavy equipment, is dead in the water without maxed ranks. The rogue is probably using skill points for more "exclusive" class skills, and is less likely to have a high strength, and so has to make the same untrained skill check with a smaller bonus.
I also disagree about non-maxed ranks being useless. Sure, all of the opposed checks from experts must be maxed out (can't beat a high-level hide/move silent check without maxed spot/listen). But there are many skills that can simply be "good enough" and get very marginal benefit from maxing. Climb, Swim, Jump, balance... unless you're an acrobat/triathlete, you won't be needing these maxed to find them useful. Craft, Profession, Alchemy, or any of the other "flavor" skills don't need huge improvements unless you really want to role-play working for a day's wages. Even mediocre ranks in Listen can be useful for hearing speaking beyond a door (the DC isn't going to get higher as you level up... the biggest difference is that the higher-level BBEG can afford thicker doors).
What I'd like to add as what I hate the most is the tremendous drain that cross-class ranks are. In addition to not being as good as someone else, ranks cost twice as much. I think more than anything else, this is something that punishes people for trying to add flavor within the skill system mechanics. A fighter who has Knowledge (Religion)? Gasp, maybe he is the son of a priest! Nobody wants to waste an entire point per level for that. My general house rule is to keep the rank cost the same between class and cross-class, but enforce the half-max-ranks cap, so some characters just have a lower ceiling of awesomeness. Multiclass characters get the benefit of all classes for max ranks, so a fighter/rogue can continually max out a few roguey skills every level.
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