Tony Vargas
Legend
I may be thinking more of Traveler as in the 'Characters & Combat' booklet, back in the day, vs /some/ d20 game.if you really think that skills in 3E/PF are capable of carrying the same heft in play as they do in Classic Traveller (where they are the whole of the PC sheet) then I guess there's no arguing it with you!
But, no, I'm not impressed by long or open-ended lists of skills, quite the opposite: I think they can undermine play by 'creating incompetence.' (and, for the record, the 3e/PF skill list is too long)
Remove "out-of-combat" and I'd agree with that sentence. ;P Seriously, though, if you had a build designed to optimize a skill or something, then it could be every bit as effective as magic in it's area of specialty.To me it seems obvious that, in 3E/PF, the main way of resolving out-of-combat challenges is not the skill system but the magic system, with the skill system acting as something of a secondary framework.
Because in-class, and because stat + skill, right? Ranks could pretty easily be the most significant portion of a skill bonus, and, yeah, I know 2 is pretty good in Traveler (at least it was, 1 was perfectly competent, IIRC), and the scale is completely different thanks to d20's proclivities...This is why I made the point that an INT 2 bruiser was also the one who was able to save the data: in Traveller it is quite feasible to have a INT 2 ex-nayy guy like this one who, as a result of the lifepath rolls, happens to have Computer-2 (in the backstory: he was passably competent in the Engineering section, but when transferred to bridge duties his limitatins became clear and he was mustered out). In D&D that role would be played by a spell-user, or (perhaps) a thief, but not by a fighter or barbarian.
I haven't played it in over 10 years (and never played it much, the "Stat Hero" classes in place of archetypes did not appeal) and can't say I recall details, but I'd be mildly surprised if there was no way to do some equivalent of cross-classing to get a slightly against-type skill or other trick.I'm not very familiar with D20 modern, but my understanding is that it is based on "talent trees" that are associated with classes, so (I assume) the real computer skill would be associated with a Smart Hero, not a Strong one.
I know the topic drifted to aping other games feelz and system-artifacts and whatnot, but I don't put much stock in it, as I've said it's a rabbit-hole with little bearing on anything.4e skill challenges use a range of devices to help "flatten" the variability of the maths - mutiple checks, use of rituals and action points and powers and "advantages" (per the Rules Compendium) - but these (i) tend to drift expertise back to a class orientation, and (ii) give the game its own feel which I will testify from experience is not very closee to Classic Traveller.
Can you do the same characters, in the same genre, in the same situations, and tell the same story?
In this case, though, I was thinking more of just the structure of the challenges. Can you have a scenario involving the elements in question, and resolve it, depending on edition, with as much interest & agency as I ever got out of Traveler (and I did play it more than a bit in the 80s - I'll laugh if 'Classic' Traveler is nothing like it was then, though I suppose I won't be too suprised).
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