Skills... WoTC Blog Post

[Wednesday Boy]

Rather than improvise and come up with something unexpected, I found, in my own gaming experiences, players combed the skill lists on the character sheet to determine what they could and couldn’t do when presented with a challenge.

I'm interested to see if the shift from skill checks to attribute checks will change this. I suspect that players who didn't have their pre-5E character jump over the pit because they had a poor Athletics/Jump skill will also have their D&D Next character not jump over the pit because they have a poor Strength skill.

 

[jodyjohnson]

I'm interested to see if the shift from skill checks to attribute checks will change this. I suspect that players who didn't have their pre-5E character jump over the pit because they had a poor Athletics/Jump skill will also have their D&D Next character not jump over the pit because they have a poor Strength skill.

At least everyone has a strength score. And when you assign it a low value, you're saying up front - my character sucks at jumping over pits.

I think it's all about the DCs. If jumping over a 10' gap with a running start is DC 10 then you can say, 'I want my character to be able to make a 10' jump and auto-succeed barring circumstances - I assigned at least a 10 to strength.'

 

[Tom Servo]

I actually really liked what this article was saying. I think it will allow for more flexibility and creativity at the table.

With the 6 ability scores being so important (to all three "pillars") I am curious how determining them will be handled. It seems that there might be even more emphasis on point buy since a bad set of stats could be really crippling for a character. Personally, I like rolling stats. I hope rolling them up will be a viable option.

 

[Dausuul]

Huh. Interesting. No earthshaking revelations, but a little more detail added to what we already know. I like the idea that skills can be more than just "+2 to this." The idea that you can use a skill to learn a language, or to have a workshop, or something like that, is pretty cool... although it does bring up the point, when the party kills a dragon and takes its hoard, and everyone has enough cash to buy half a dozen workshops if they want, hasn't the character who took Workshop wasted her skill slot? Or can you use the money to somehow "buy back" your Workshop slot and learn another skill? Or does the slot also include the skill to operate the Workshop, which you would not otherwise have?

I really want to see how this system works in practice. In theory, it sounds pretty good.

 

[Steely_Dan]

I am happy as a pig in faeces that Ability Scores are the core of every character (love the flattening of math, like in my 4th Ed campaign, removing the unnecessary 1/2 level from all character's and monster's attacks, defences, and skills has opened up a much better game).

 

[Dausuul]

What if the game became "No matter what you pick, you don't suck". That would be worse.

Why would that be worse? It sounds fine to me. I see no reason why the rules should allow the inadvertent creation of a sucky character. If you want to make a PC who sucks, it should be a deliberate decision and the book should tell you straight up, "You're gonna suck if you do this."

Of course, any PC can still suck in play, if the player doesn't use the character's abilities effectively. You can build the most optimized 3.X wizard ever, 20th level grey elf with maximum Intelligence and Initiate of the Cheesyfold Veil and every broken-ass spell from glitterdust to shapechange, and it will still suck if played by someone who thinks the thing to do is buff yourself with bull's strength and charge into melee.

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

I'm interested to see if the shift from skill checks to attribute checks will change this. I suspect that players who didn't have their pre-5E character jump over the pit because they had a poor Athletics/Jump skill will also have their D&D Next character not jump over the pit because they have a poor Strength skill.

I think the reduction in gap between skilled and unskilled will encourage this.

 

[Ahnehnois]

Why would that be worse? It sounds fine to me. I see no reason why the rules should allow the inadvertent creation of a sucky character. If you want to make a PC who sucks, it should be a deliberate decision and the book should tell you straight up, "You're gonna suck if you do this."

Of course, any PC can still suck in play, if the player doesn't use the character's abilities effectively. You can take the most optimized 3.X wizard ever, 20th level with maximum Intelligence and Initiate of the Cheesyfold Veil and every broken-ass spell from glitterdust to shapechange, and it will still suck if played by someone who thinks the thing to do is buff yourself with bull's strength and charge into melee.

I think you kind of answered your own question. The point is not that the rules should be unclear, it is that they should be conclusive. If you are in a dungeoncrawl game, and you choose to play a character focused on horseback riding, your character should suck. If your campaign is a war against illithids and you design a character with a low will save, your character should suck. If your game is in a gladiiatorial arena and you play a diviner, your character should suck. The rules need to allow these possibilities. If your character is appropriate and reasonably well-designed, it should not suck. But you should have to think substantially during character creation.

 

[Steely_Dan]

Why would that be worse? It sounds fine to me. I see no reason why the rules should allow the inadvertent creation of a sucky character. If you want to make a PC who sucks, it should be a deliberate decision and the book should tell you straight up, "You're gonna suck if you do this."

Of course, any PC can still suck in play, if the player doesn't use the character's abilities effectively. You can build the most optimized 3.X wizard ever, 20th level grey elf with maximum Intelligence and Initiate of the Cheesyfold Veil and every broken-ass spell from glitterdust to shapechange, and it will still suck if played by someone who thinks the thing to do is buff yourself with bull's strength and charge into melee.

Yes, but we also don't want child-saftey D&D.

Like those games for Special Needs children (no offence), where everyone's a winner all the time!

 

[Dausuul]

If your character is appropriate and reasonably well-designed, it should not suck.

Ahh, here's the rub.

if your character is appropriate: Yes, I agree. The game should allow the creation of a mounted combat specialist, even though that specialty might suck in certain styles of campaign. That's just a necessary part of building a game that accommodates different styles.

and reasonably well-designed: Whoa, there. This is the part I don't agree with. I really dislike the idea that characters need to be "designed." I want chargen to work like this:

The Rules: What sort of a character do you want to play?
The Player: I want to be a holy paladin who charges into battle on her trusty steed and skewers monsters on a lance.
The Rules: Okay then. Paladin class plus Mounted Warrior theme plus a lance. Here you go.

As opposed to:

The Rules: What sort of a character do you want to play?
The Player: I want to be a holy paladin who charges into battle on her trusty steed and skewers monsters on a lance.
The Rules: Here are 3 classes, 8 skills, and 15 feats that might be appropriate to such a character. Out of those, there are four or five combinations that will be effective. The rest range from mediocre to pathetic.
The Player: Uh... which is which?
The Rules: Figure it out for yourself.

I got more than enough of the latter in 3E and 4E. I want as little of it as possible in D&DN.