cartography: craft or profession?

[Korin Tempest]

one of my fellow players is putting together a cartographer character, wondering if cartography would fall under craft or profession.. any takers?

 

[fba827]

My own personal guideline has been "Is there an end tangible product?"

In this case, there would be -- the maps. So I'd go with craft.

That isn't to say an easy argument could be made the other way.. but my opinion would be craft.

 

[Malin Genie]

Song and Silence, for what it's worth, lists Profession (cartographer) as a prerequisite for the Royal Explorer class.

Personally, as my Barbarian/Ranger has much better Wisdom than Intelligence, I have gone with Profession and pointed to that as evidence in favour of my interpretation ^_^

 

[dcollins]

And then to throw another monkey wrench in the mix, Sword & Fist lists cartography as a Knowledge skill for the "Pirate" character type (p. 55).

 

[fba827]

And it seemed like such a simple question ...

 

[Spatzimaus]

My guidelines:

A> If it makes a usable, distinct item, whose creation time is normally measured in days, it's Craft. Note the qualifiers there: making twenty sandwiches is Profession (Chef), not Craft (sandwich). Well, unless it's a sandwich made from Perfectly Normal Beast or something.

B> If not A, and it requires some sort of physical effort, it's Profession.

C> If not A and B, it's probably a Knowledge skill.

For cartography? Depends what specifically you're referring to:
> Making a map: Craft.
> Reading a map to get specific, obscure information: Knowledge.
> Using a map you made to do perform mundane tasks: Profession.

In each case, I wouldn't call it a cartography skill; it might be Craft (calligraphy), Knowledge (geography), and Profession (sailor) for the above three checks.

 

[Drawmack]

I would also say it depends.

the cartographer who has mapped out the entire region probably has profession(cartographer).

the groups mapper probably has craft and knowledge cartography.

someone who does not make, but uses maps would have knowledge cartography.

 

[Korin Tempest]

Thanks for all the replies... with all the information I've gotten, I'm thinking that Profession probably is the most logical choice... thanks for all your advice...

 

[AuraSeer]

IMO, if cartography is your career, you probably have several related skills.

Profession (surveyor) would represent taking measurements and notes about the world. When you're exploring a new area, preparing to make the first map about it, you'd be using this skill.

Craft (cartography) would be skill in actually drawing a map. This is how you'd convert surveyors' notes into a pictorial map that normal people could read.

Knowledge (maps) is unapplied book learning. It might let you recall whether a certain area has ever been mapped before, how long ago, and which library you should visit to find a copy of the map.

This is similar to the difference between Profession (architect), Craft (stonemasonry), and Knowledge (architecture).

 

[dshai527]

I have always viewed the Profession skill as the ability to make money off of a talent. In this case cartography. It doesn't make you any better than anyone else at the actual craft, except maybe a synergy bonus, it makes you better able to make money off of what you do know. You may be only able to read and write generic maps but you know how and who to market to in order to get the most for your money. I think the craft skill would be someone who is actually good at the actual creation/reading of the map, he just might not know how to make money from it.

Just my opinion on the two skills.