The Illusion of Powergaming

[Pbartender]

Swim? Because the farm had a nearby lake, and the kid skivved off to the lake everyday?

Jump? Because there wasn't much else to do?

Ride? Because they had a big farm, and the horse had to serve multiple functions, not just drag the plow?

Knowledge (Religion)? because the old man was a religious nut and made the family attend services?

Sure, but those skills and their explainations don't really anything to do with farming specifically. There's nothing in those skills that would help you plant turnips.

What I'm saying is that there are DMs, I've played under more than a few, who would require a player with a character that has a turnip farmer background to spend a significant number of skill points and/or feats on turnip farming. Often those skills and feats are wasted because...

Skills are only as useless as a player's imagination (or lack thereof) and/or as the DM allows them to be.

...As el-remmen points out, the player often forgets about them as useless and never looks for an opportunity to use them, and/or the DM never offers up them chance to use them.

If a player in my game puts ranks into Profession (farmer) I will try to work that into the campaign at some point or another if at all possible, examples might include:

* Actually planting and growing something
* Having a general knowledge of the tenancy laws of where they come from
* Synergy in gathering info from farmers because of a common ground of professions parlance
* Understanding how a grain mill or similar technology works (which would make a great scene for a combat)
* Catching someone in a lie because of false detail regarding the process of farming.

Etc. . .Etc. . .

I try to as well, but in my experience that's more the exception than the norm. And even then, there's a limit to how often you can include such skills without it appearing contrived.

 

[el-remmen]

I try to as well, but in my experience that's more the exception than the norm. And even then, there's a limit to how often you can include such skills without it appearing contrived.

Yeah, but even once can often be enough to open players' eyes about how to use their skills - personally, I like to reward creative skill use. I am not saying I always allow it, but if it is reasonable I will give it a chance.

 

[Reynard]

What I'm saying is that there are DMs, I've played under more than a few, who would require a player with a character that has a turnip farmer background to spend a significant number of skill points and/or feats on turnip farming.

IMO, requiring such a thing is dumb on multiple levels. One, it actually punishes players for coming up with backgrounds since they'll be "wasting" skill points, etc... and things that don't matter one whit to adventuring. Two, how hard is turnip farming? If a child can do it by taking 10, then no skill points should be required. Three, the numbers on the character sheet do not represent the extent of all the character knows and is -- those numbers represent the character in relation to various game mechanics surrounding fantasy advenuring. It reminds me arguments about magic in D&D worlds where people assume the spells in the PHB are the only spells in the world and how that breaks a setting -- they are not the only spells in the world, they are the spells adventurers use while adventuring; adventurers don't need to know all the miscellaneous magics used by hedge wizards the world round. Same can be said for skills, feats and even PrCs: there's probably a whole encyclopedia of "civilian" versions of PC mechanics out there, but they don't matter because the PCs are action adventure heroes.

I try to as well, but in my experience that's more the exception than the norm. And even then, there's a limit to how often you can include such skills without it appearing contrived.

Quite. Not only that, it takes a high degree of skill and imagination to include such things ina way that is unique and entertaining and doesn't plain bog the game down with mundane, boring stuff like planting turnips.

 

[el-remmen]

Quite. Not only that, it takes a high degree of skill and imagination to include such things in a way that is unique and entertaining and doesn't plain bog the game down with mundane, boring stuff like planting turnips.

You have inspired me to write an adventure involving the planting and growing of turnips.

 

[Greg K]

I have expanded a number of profession skills to be more like what the did with profession (Sailor) in Stormwrack, and I allow it to give increasing synergy bonuses to other skills - for example, I allow Profession (soldier) checks to be made to gain bonuses to things like staying up on watch, forced marches, etc. . .

Yep. I also give synergy bonuses and occassionaly will allow it to substitute for another skill under specific circumstances.

 

[Greg K]

But that is only of any use to a professional anyway.... Adventurers don't need professionals! They just kill things and take their stuff!

That might be how you play. Personally, the groups I know, approach the game differently.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

No. if you want to be a doctor, then you are going to have to go to college,then med school and then do your residency. Either delay adventuring and finish your training, put your training on hold to go adventuring full time or accept the fact that your training is going to take a hell of a longer to complete if you are only going to train part time. However, don't complain that you cannot instantly gain the benefits of medical training when you have been spending time galavanting in dungeons or travelling between them.

My point was that you dont accept "I want to do X", where X is rage, use stunning fist, or dodge fireballs, as a valid reason for taking a class. Wanting to learn to do something is the exact reason MOST people train.

The issue wasnt time to get a new class, it was that "I want to get stunning fist" is unacceptable.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

Right, but wouldn't a good game design let you have useless skills, for flavor, without costing you anything in terms of useful skills, which come into play regularly, in life-and-death situations that are central to the game?

IMO, yes. You dont spend a feat for the sole purpose of getting different color eyes. Yeah, maybe blue eyes are rare, but so are PC's.

 

[Greg K]

I personally would rather D&D have "action skills" and "background skills" like 3rd edition Shadowrun.

Green Ronin's Thieves World has something called Background which gives you four skills points to spend among certain skills determined by background. I think there are some other OGL games that do the same. The first time I encountered something similar was in Swashbuckling Adventures (if I recall correctly), but you had to spend a feat on the background.

I would prefer that system far more over D&D's system and it would hopefully put an end to the elitist way of thinking that you should waste skill points in worthless skills because it's from your background.

As opposed to the powergamer approach that you shouldn't have to spend skills to reflect background, because its not mechanically efficient?

 

[Pbartender]

Yeah, but even once can often be enough to open players' eyes about how to use their skills - personally, I like to reward creative skill use. I am not saying I always allow it, but if it is reasonable I will give it a chance.

Agreed.

IMO, requiring such a thing is dumb on multiple levels. One, it actually punishes players for coming up with backgrounds since they'll be "wasting" skill points, etc... and things that don't matter one whit to adventuring. Two, how hard is turnip farming? If a child can do it by taking 10, then no skill points should be required. Three, the numbers on the character sheet do not represent the extent of all the character knows and is -- those numbers represent the character in relation to various game mechanics surrounding fantasy advenuring.

Yep... My standard reply to the DMs that did that was always something like, "Untrained laborers and assistants (that is, characters without any ranks in Profession) earn an average of 1 silver piece per day... I never said he was good at turnip farming. If he had been, he never would have taken up burglary. Besides he learned so many other more useful skills on the farm, things like Swimming, Climbing, Handling Animals and Riding."