D&D 5E I want skills decoupled from stats. Suggestions?

[dave2008]

I like the flexibility of your system and the ability to have a broader range of skill bonuses. However, I don't like throwing out the stat bonus (it is to much of a disconnect from my own experiences). I would rather use your idea to replace the proficiency bonus on skills and keep the stat bonus. Or, more likely, I would add skill points on top of the existing system.

 

[schnee]

I think it's better if there's some room for middle ground instead of the all or nothing nature proficiency alone would give to skills.

If your table is all 3E/PF savvy, it'll be fine, and everything I say is not relevant because those types of players enjoy the system mastery mini-game, but I know it would make skills opaque and inaccessible to all the new players at my current table. But, I have a critique if you're open to it.

--

I'm going to poke at this, if you don't mind, because I think Bounded accuracy basically accomplishes that now, and the mechanic you're proposing won't add enough to the game to merit the complexity.

Bounded accuracy means DC range is relatively narrow for most things. The idea isn't to have a constantly escalating DC over time like some previous editions, but to keep using 10-20 for 90% of all checks.

With that in mind, most players are in the middle ground. That's what 'Proficiency' is. Rogue/Bard expertise is the 'High' ground, and unskilled with only natural talent (or lack thereof) is the 'low' ground.

The fact that 'Proficient' characters all move along in relatively the same pace means the system can make assumptions about DCs, and the odds of players making or failing checks, and build monster/obstacle math around that. If the skill system is completely 'free form', then players have to develop system mastery to even know what a 'middle ground' is without wasting points accidentally.

So, I'm sure the right players would make it work and enjoy the granular tweaking, but it's definitely not for everyone.

 

[ccs]

Assign each skill a score.
Pick a skill.
Roll 4d4 for it. (Range of 4-16)
That's how good you are at it.
To make a skill check, roll 1d20. Success = roll your score or less.
Prof. In a skill adds +2 to its score. The highest skill rating you can have is 18.

You can figure out some way to increase scores for non-18 skills from there with some fiddling.

 

[FrogReaver]

If your table is all 3E/PF savvy, it'll be fine, and everything I say is not relevant because those types of players enjoy the system mastery mini-game, but I know it would make skills opaque and inaccessible to all the new players at my current table. But, I have a critique if you're open to it.

--

I'm going to poke at this, if you don't mind, because I think Bounded accuracy basically accomplishes that now, and the mechanic you're proposing won't add enough to the game to merit the complexity.

Bounded accuracy means DC range is relatively narrow for most things. The idea isn't to have a constantly escalating DC over time like some previous editions, but to keep using 10-20 for 90% of all checks.

With that in mind, most players are in the middle ground. That's what 'Proficiency' is. Rogue/Bard expertise is the 'High' ground, and unskilled with only natural talent (or lack thereof) is the 'low' ground.

The fact that 'Proficient' characters all move along in relatively the same pace means the system can make assumptions about DCs, and the odds of players making or failing checks, and build monster/obstacle math around that. If the skill system is completely 'free form', then players have to develop system mastery to even know what a 'middle ground' is without wasting points accidentally.

So, I'm sure the right players would make it work and enjoy the granular tweaking, but it's definitely not for everyone.

1. I don't understand how that critique applies to my proposal because I'm proposing to keep proficiency exactly the same. It's the stat bonus to skills that the "free form" component will replace. Then again my "free form" component isn't compleltely free form as it has a number of restriction on it. So why argue against a completlely free form system?
2. I believe the system mastery required for standard d&d 5e is comparable to the system mastery required for this system.
3. This is not a proposal to make skills like 3e. I hated how 3e handled skills. Most were so narrow and that made many nearly worthless. There also were so many that you were very bad at the vast majority of things in the game. But I don't want to spend more time critiquing 3e.

Proficiency in my system would still be the training component. It's just skill points rather than stats would show your natural aptitude for the tasks that skills govern. Thus, skill points would be an abstraction and you would be able to fluff them however you needed

4. I don't think it takes any kind of exceptional or rare player to be happy that his fighter can actually be as persuasive as any other character in the group or for the Barbarian to realize he can be just as perceptive as the cleric. Rangers could be great at investigation. It would no longer just be wizards that were the best there. Or wizards could just as stealthy as anyone else. (all this barring expertise of course). Now I get if you don't like breaking that barrier for nostalgia or some other preferences but to suggest that I need some kind of special players to enjoy what this system can provide that the original system cannot is just...

 

[Satyrn]

How does one best decouple skills from stats in 5e? My current thought is keeping stats for combat and special ability purposes but eliminating the stat bonus to skills. Proficiency to skills would be handled the same. However, instead of stat bonus to skills you would get maybe 20-30 skill points to set your skills however you wanted. All skills would start at -2 and you could spend skill points on them until they reach +3 base (+5 with proficiency added to it). At each level you take an ASI you would get 2 more skill points that must be placed in different skills. All skills can be raised to +5 by the skill points from ASI's (or +11 total with max proficiency bonus).

Thoughts? Opinions? Suggestions?

This isn't gonna be helpful, but's my thought.

I'd rather see all the combat stuff decoupled from stats (specifically not applying to attack, damage, spell DCs, and a few other things).

I'd like the stats to be descriptive of a characters skills, and saves. Like a super strong character would be great at strength stuff, but without that automatically translating to massive combat damage we might actually get balanced Herculean* characters.

 

[FrogReaver]

I like the flexibility of your system and the ability to have a broader range of skill bonuses. However, I don't like throwing out the stat bonus (it is to much of a disconnect from my own experiences). I would rather use your idea to replace the proficiency bonus on skills and keep the stat bonus. Or, more likely, I would add skill points on top of the existing system.

That's understandable. I find stat bonuses to skills constantly getting in the way of what I want to make but it's fair and understandable some people like them. If you like the stat bonuses you could easily tweak this to replace just the proficiency component (assuming you like this better than it). Having all 3 could be cool. I personally didn't want to change the skill math that drastically but in a game designed from scratch that wouldn't be a bad way to go.

 

[FrogReaver]

This isn't gonna be helpful, but's my thought.

I'd rather see all the combat stuff decoupled from stats (specifically not applying to attack, damage, spell DCs, and a few other things).

I'd like the stats to be descriptive of a characters skills, and saves. Like a super strong character would be great at strength stuff, but without that automatically translating to massive combat damage we might actually get balanced Herculean* characters.

I would too. I totally agree with all of that. That said, the skill system I'm suggesting is an easy to implement "compromise" that gets most of the way there without having to change too much. When using this subsystem you can think of skills as being what your character is instead of stats. Stats can be viewed as a necessary relic to allow the game to play smoothly and give you combat balance.

 

[Satyrn]

You're right. It would be essentially the same result.

Now, I do have a suggestion. I'd drop everything about 5e skills. Absolutely everything from the skill list, the tools, the idea of adding the proficiency bonus and whatever else there is.

And then I'd comb through games like Shadowrun, Call of Cthulhu, World of Darkness, etc for a skill system that was suitably complex to justify the change while being straightforward enough to fit 5e and figure out away to slot it in.

I think the change ought to be a big one.

 

[FrogReaver]

You're right. It would be essentially the same result.

Now, I do have a suggestion. I'd drop everything about 5e skills. Absolutely everything from the skill list, the tools, the idea of adding the proficiency bonus and whatever else there is.

And then I'd comb through games like Shadowrun, Call of Cthulhu, World of Darkness, etc for a skill system that was suitably complex to justify the change while being straightforward enough to fit 5e and figure out away to slot it in.

I think the change ought to be a big one.

I like 5e skills. I think they got the list about right. It's not too specific and it's not overly general. Maybe there is a better skill system out there that you could tack on. But things that affect skills touch so much in the game. I think we can decouple skills from stats. I don't know if we can decouple class and race skill proficiencies as well. I don't know if we can decouple expertise or the enhance ability spell that gives advantage on certain skills. 5e is very intertwined. You gotta be careful when you try and make a big sweeping change.

 

[FarBeyondC]

While not a decoupling so to speak, couldn't you more extensively use the skills with different abilities variant (PHB 175) to solve a lot of the problems from the examples given?