D&D 5E Thoughts on 5e skills.

I use the variant rule for skills on page 175 of the players handbook. It's basically saying to use whatever ability/skill combo that would apply to the situation.

That let me remove skills that made less sense. Here is what I ended up with in my house rule document:

SKills
Remove the 'Investigation' skill. The perception skill will be used for anything that would fall under investigation. Players can use intelligence or wisdom for perception.
Remove the 'Acrobatics' skill. The athletics skill can be used for dexterity checks that require balance or complex maneuvers.
Remove 'Animal Handling'. Use Nature with wisdom, charisma, or intelligence (whatever is appropriate) for animal interaction.

Skills are not always tied directly to ability scores (pg 175 Player's Handbook). While many skills will still be closely tied with the ability score (like stealth with dexterity or history with intelligence), some skill checks may have different abilities that a player may use for their roll.

If a player wants to use strength or intelligence in an intimidation check, they can if it makes sense for the situation. There are many cases when int and wis can be interchanged for medicine or nature depending on what the player is trying to do.

Other Examples:
Dexterity for performance with a flute, str for performance with a drum, charisma for performance while singing.
Str with animal handling while trying to rein in a wild horse by force, wis with animal handling while trying to rein the horse in with his favorite treat, chr with animal handling to calm a wild horse with a song.

Click to expand...

Another thing to think about is using the optional skill rule from the DMG Chapter 9. That removes all skills and the character would be proficient in all checks based on an ability score. They would get one proficient ability based on class and another based on background.

The difference between Acrobatics and Athletics can be best sum up I think during grappling. A grappler must make a Strength (Athletics) check to subdue someone by force, but the grapplee must oppose it with their own brute strength (Athletics) or worm their way out of his grip (Acrobatics). However, just because you have high dexterity (good with hand-eye coordination and motor skills) does not mean you are good on the mat. It takes training (Proficiency) in order to know how to do that.

Another note. Just because you don't have Proficiency in something does not mean you are not good at it. You just are not as good as you could be. You are only bad at a skill if you have a negative in it. If you have a +3 in Dex you automatically have a +3 in Stealth, Acrobatics, and Sleight of Hand. While each of those require fine motor skills, they are very different in practice. Proficiency makes the difference between "good" and "great".

For Performance being helpful in a campaign setting... That really depends on the creativity of the player. A character with Proficiency in Performance could distract the guards or dragon with a song and dance number while the rest of the party sneaks by. Maybe the only way to win the king's favor is to cheer up the young prince who just lost his mother. Maybe the party needs to make some quick coin but is averse to stealing, so they decide to do a street performance. It's all about creativity on both the players' and DM's side. You have a PC that's Proficient in Performance? Then make a circumstance for them to shine.

Removing a skill does not remove your ability to do the activities the skill previsously represented in game nor does it eliminate the ability to resolve doing the action by a check.

i see slot of posts saying activity x is useful sometimes therefore the skill is useful in the game. That eniterely misses the point! You can still allow activity x without tying it to its own specific skill.

FrogReaver said:

Removing a skill does not remove your ability to do the activities the skill previsously represented in game nor does it eliminate the ability to resolve doing the action by a check.

i see slot of posts saying activity x is useful sometimes therefore the skill is useful in the game. That eniterely misses the point! You can still allow activity x without tying it to its own specific skill.

Click to expand...

Then you don't need skills at all, by that reasoning. Which is fine.

But also consider that a player taking proficiency in a skill is doing so as a form of identification for the character. "I envision my character as X, Y, Z, therefore I am taking THIS skill." You could also say that a player taking a given skill is telling the DM in so many words what kind of content he or she wants to see. (Though personally, I'm of a mind that a player should build a character appropriate for the game the DM is presenting instead of taking something in hopes the DM includes particular content, but nevermind.)

One of the things I like to do with skills is differentiate between what a trained character can do vs. an untrained. For example, anyone can attempt an Arcana check, but if the character isn't trained, there's some information he simply won't get, no matter the roll. This helps avoid the problem of every player attempting a roll, hoping one person rolls high. (Group checks also handle this problem well.)

It also helps with lesser-used skills like Animal Handling. Knowing how to get a pack of wolves to not attack, that certain creatures are only active at night, how to tame a young bulette so you can train it as a mount...all those things can be useful, but only to the trained. Unfortunately, I've noticed that my current players rarely think of such things - if it's not obvious, default to swords and spells. So I have to nudge them - sometimes more than nudge - so they start thinking along different lines.

Oh, and I have seen Performance used once to great (and hilarious) success. The party wanted to infiltrate an old, broken down keep. The Tiefling Bard approached the gate and put on a exotic dance performance to distract the guards, while everyone else scaled the walls. I didn't think much of the idea, until she rolled a natural 20. So I had the gate guards holler to the other guards, "Hey, come look at the babe with the horns!" The rest got in and sacked the place. Never would have happened if the player hadn't been thinking outside the box. So as Iserith stated, it all depends on the campaign, and the group, as to which skills are most useful.

FrogReaver said:

Overall I like 5e's notion of less skills.

Click to expand...

5e actually nets one more skill even if you don't count tool proficiencies, which act prettymuch exactly like skills, as such. Tool Proficiencies are open-ended, so there could be any number of them, if the DM decided the setting called for it.

However, IMO there's some skills that are next to pointless and would be better handled by class or background ribbon style abilities.

Click to expand...

"Tool Proficiencies" could be given as such for backgrounds or folded into skills, when more adventuring-applicable.

*Animal Handling.
*Performance.

Click to expand...

If mounts were more useful/workable, Animal Handling might be worth it, otherwise, could be a Background-associated 'ribbon.' Performance certainly seems like it could just come with a background.

*Acrobatics.
Athletics

Click to expand...

Acrobatics & Athletics could probably be rolled together, and the DM just call for STR or DEX checks based on the action declared.

Investigation
Sleight of Hand

Click to expand...

Investigation could probably be folded into Perception and/or Insight, and the DM just call for INT vs WIS (or even CHA for questioning, say). Thing is, perception's kinda major.

I wish every class got the option of expertise in some limited subset of skills. Like wizards can pick between arcana and investigation expertise. Fighters can pick athletics or stealth. Rangers automatically get perception and survival. ETC.

Click to expand...

That sounds reasonable, and there were those UA feats that essentially gave out expertise. But, it runs the risk of making Expertise, rather than Proficiency, the litmus test for a character being 'good' at something.

I would agree that all classes should have access to Expertise at least once. I've often thought that it could be a Feat that can be taken more than once, but applied to an individual skill or tool proficiency only once.

In no particular order the skill rolls I ask for the most frequently are Perception, Stealth, Investigation, Acrobatics, Persuasion, Intimidation and Animal Handling (because most of the party has decided to buy and train pets )

akr71 said:

I would agree that all classes should have access to Expertise at least once. I've often thought that it could be a Feat that can be taken more than once, but applied to an individual skill or tool proficiency only once.

In no particular order the skill rolls I ask for the most frequently are Perception, Stealth, Investigation, Acrobatics, Persuasion, Intimidation and Animal Handling (because most of the party has decided to buy and train pets )

Click to expand...

I'm surprised that Athletics is not on there for grappling and climbing/jumping. I know a dex based character will try to talk you into letting them acrobat their way up a wall or rope, but I try to disuade the players from shenanigans like that.

MrHotter said:

I'm surprised that Athletics is not on there for grappling and climbing/jumping. I know a dex based character will try to talk you into letting them acrobat their way up a wall or rope, but I try to disuade the players from shenanigans like that.

Click to expand...

Climbing doesn't require an Athletics check. Only if it's slippery or have few handholds does the outcome become uncertain enough to warrant an ability check. Jumping doesn't require one either unless you're trying to clear a low obstacle or trying to jump higher than you normally can, at the DM's discretion.

FrogReaver said:

Overall I like 5e's notion of less skills. However, IMO there's some skills that are next to pointless and would be better handled by class or background ribbon style abilities.

*Animal Handling.
*Performance.
*Acrobatics.
These abilities are probably the least useful in the game and likely could have either been rolled into another ability like Insight for Animal Handling or Persuasion for Performance or Athletics for Acrobatics or they could have been left as straight stat checks instead of having an associated skill. You could tie a ribbon ability to a background or class to buff these types of abilities if that was really desired and leave them out of the skill system entirely.

Click to expand...

Generally, in the case of "these skills aren't very useful", I think the problem isn't the skill but in how it's approached in 5e (or sometimes just in D&D in general).

While I haven't seen a lot of Performance checks in my games, I can respond about how I handle Animal Handling & Acrobatics, and have found those 2 skills to be plenty useful. There's a few house rules in here, just because I wanted bolster the utility of skills and clarify their use.

Animal Handling in my games covers Riding, Reading an Animal's Behavior, Soothing an Animal, and Training an Animal.

Acrobatics in my games covers Balancing (PHB), Diving to Mitigate Falling Damage (Homebrew), and Tumbling (DMG).

I do think Performance could use some clarification as to how it's used & how it's different from, say, flute proficiency. I also think several tool proficiencies could use clarification.

*Semi useful abilities
Athletics
All knowledge skills
Medicine
Investigation
Sleight of Hand

Click to expand...

I've found the utility of these skills depends more on the DM creating opportunities for their use. Also, several of these skills have "hidden" uses. For example...

Athletics is also used for grappling and can be used for escaping (including from webs), Climbing onto a Bigger Creature (DMG), Overrunning (DMG), and Shoving Aside (DMG).

While it's not RAW, I allow Medicine to be used forensically in my games. Players enjoy it.

Investigation is also used to see through illusions.

Knowledge skills in D&D (and most RPGs I've encountered) all run into the same issue: DM regurgitates information, player turns to other players and says "I tell you guys that" (or not), and nothing is really ventured or risked, there are no stakes. Maybe if they roll a 1 or something, the DM tells the player misinformation with a wink wink nudge nudge, and everyone gets a chuckle, maaaaybe the player riffs off of that and creates an inconvenience for the party. The assumption behind knowledge skills seems to be that even if there's no risk, it's worthwhile rolling to see to what degree you succeed (i.e. how much do you know?). What this does is encourages a Weight of Numbers / Pile-On Rolling approach.

Instead, I think Knowledge skills are essentially different than other types of skills, but we've just been using the same system since late 2e or 3e. Knowledge skills IMO are a better fit for something like 5e's backgrounds. They provide a baseline of information at the outset of a quest/adventure, or a resource you can tap when you visit a suitable site during your adventures. There's no roll involved.

Now, that's one approach.

Another approach is attaching utility to each knowledge skill so the issue I've raised is still there, it's just less of a glaring thing because there are all these other things you can do with Arcana, for instance.

For example, Arcana might be used in several ways...

• Decipher symbols (maybe similar to d20's decipher script...heck I've seen official D&D games on Twitch treat Arcana as detect magic even)
• Magical Lore (magical traditions, magic items, & the planes)
• Spellcraft (identifying spells & rituals)

*Very useful skills
Deception
Persuasion
Intimidation
Survival
Perception
Insight
Stealth

Click to expand...

Perception bothers me. Or how it's handled in many of the examples in the PHB & DMG. I know it's a play style thing, and I can do my own thing, but I don't like the style that's become "mainstream" D&D where lots of Perception checks are being called for, often for really stupid stuff. You can see this on the recent Twitch streams. My pet peeve is when a player says "I am going to make a Perception check", like I'm supposed to read their mind about what their intention is. My other pet peeve is when a DM, replying to a player who has made a Perception check, says something like "You notice the faint outline of a pit trap on the floor before you." Just Ugh.

I wish every class got the option of expertise in some limited subset of skills. Like wizards can pick between arcana and investigation expertise. Fighters can pick athletics or stealth. Rangers automatically get perception and survival. ETC.

Click to expand...

I actually like how Expertise is limited to Bard and Rogue. It just *feels* right to me, it feels like D&D where those two classes have been the skill monkeys and skill experts. Generally, however, I support D&D as a game with well-defined classes.