D&D 4E Seamanship in 4e

[BigCat]

I'm about to start a campaign which will have the PCs on boats much of the time, and I'm trying to figure out how to handle boat-related skills. Back in the 3.x days I just used Profession (sailor), but I'd rather not add a whole new skill (although one of my players made a convincing case that Seamanship was a reasonable analogue to Dungeoneering). The default option would just use whatever skill is closest to the check at hand, but I would like some way to represent a character as a skilled sailor. Another suggestion was to invent a Seamanship feat that applied to ship-related checks (eg, +3 to Nature checks to navigate, +3 to Athletics checks to climb rigging, etc.). Thoughts? Has anyone handled this yet?

 

[Ryujin]

Too mechanical. If it's important to the campaign, then just make sure that all the characters take an appropriate background. With the background comes the basic knowledge and skillset.

Would anyone playing a FR campaign ever think that a Sword Coast Corsair didn't have a knowledge of seamanship?

 

[Regicide]

Nothing heroic ever happened at sea, thus there isn't any sailor/seamanship skill. Pulling ropes and stuff is for the non-heroic people, if your players need to do it, they're heroes and can do it better than any of the actual sailors, since sailors aren't heroes. They'll also never fall off a deck and can very easily run along or swing from a rope.

 

[Ryan_Singer]

Do a skill challenge. Have the checks play out over the course of the journey, beating the challenge get your XP equal to an encounter and exactly where you are going. Losing gets you lost, and you can do another challenge to get where you are going, but not in time.

 

[BigCat]

Do a skill challenge. Have the checks play out over the course of the journey, beating the challenge get your XP equal to an encounter and exactly where you are going. Losing gets you lost, and you can do another challenge to get where you are going, but not in time.

Sure, but what skills to use for the challenge? And how do the PCs who are supposed to be sailors shine? The ranger will have a better Nature roll, etc.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

its balance, climb, use rope, astonomy, nature, woodworking maybe, all rolled into one skill (at i handled it that way 3.5)

conclusion: most professions were only useful for npc commoners... heroes rather had some skillpoints in climb etc...

In 4e i would rule it as a skill challenge using acrobatics, athletics, nature...

 

[ppaladin123]

Sorry the title called for this:

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJrIF7pHyO0]YouTube - Seaman Ship![/ame]

 

[ppaladin123]

snip

Now for a serious answer. Check out the forgotten realms player's guide for the paragon path: sword coast corsair. The class features involve bonuses to skill checks related to seamanship. It might give you some ideas about what skills to use when.

 

[chitzk0i]

Sure, but what skills to use for the challenge? And how do the PCs who are supposed to be sailors shine? The ranger will have a better Nature roll, etc.

The skill challenge could have graduated goals. You need, for instance, four successes to get there at all, eight to get there in a reasonable time at all, and if you get something like 10 or more successes, maybe you could actually get there ahead of the bad guys or whatever. To keep it interesting, say that three successes fails.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Meh, all logic chopping aside, seamanship is a skill set. It is just as much a skill set as dungeoneering (and there is really a lot more of an argument for it than for dungeoneering, whatever that is).

Personally I'd just make it a skill. I know, skill proliferation is a bad thing and I don't generally think adding skills is recommended, but IMHO this one is a special case. Why is it a special case? Because it is a skill that some adventurers are likely to want to have. They will use it often and they will use it in dangerous conditions in the course of an adventure. Carpentry is not a candidate for a skill. Nobody is staking their adventuring life on being able to build a house. Maybe once in a blue moon some situation comes up where it would be nice to be a carpenter and you slap in dungeoneering or something. No adventurer would give up say Insight skill for carpentry. They might very well do so for Seamanship, find it a good trade, and use it often to dramatic effect.

In short I think it is a special case skill, on a par with dungeoneering. In adventure settings that lack ships it simply won't ever be used. In ones that do, it could be used as often as any other skill. If the campaign shifts from one type of setting to the other, no big deal, just retrain it in or out.