2d10 skill checks

[candidus_cogitens]

I've entertained this as a house rule for all players and all skills, but here I propose it as a feat. If you can come up with a better title, I'd appreciate it. How would you rate this feat in terms of power? Do you foresee any special problems with certain skills?

TRUSTY SKILLS
With certain skills, you have unusual confidence which helps you to be more consistent and reliable.
Benefit: Choose two skills, in which you have at least one rank. At your option, you may roll 2d10 instead of d20 for checks when using these skills.
Special: This option is allowed even when taking 10 and taking 20 are not allowed.
...........

Simple as that! Not only does it give you a +0.5 boost to your average result, it also gives you a much higher chance of getting an average performance and thus a much lower chance of doing really poorly.

Instead of having a 5% chance of getting a given result on your roll (as you would with a d20), here's how the probability would break down with 2d10:

20 (or 2) ... 1%
19 (or 3) ... 2%
18 (or 4) ... 3%
17 (or 5) ... 4%
16 (or 6) ... 5%
15 (or 7) ... 6%
14 (or 8) ... 7%
13 (or 9) ... 8%
12 (or 10)... 9%
11 ... 10%

 

[Jeph]

Um . . . a game with that feat wouldn't be d20 system.

 

[DanMcS]

That was an... insightful criticism.

I guess the motivation for this would be to bell-type-curve out some skills. I'm not sure that's desireable, but if you want it, this will certainly accomplish it. I'd call it 'consistent results'. Wouldn't it be simpler just to have the feat allow taking 10 in more situations?

 

[Crothian]

Intersting idea. I'm not sure it's powerful enough to need a feat since the take 10 and take 20 rules might be easier.

 

[bensei]

I once had the idea, too, but I allowed it for attack roles. It could be very useful for fighters once they have found out how high the AC of their opponent is. The drawback of course is that you are also very unlikely to do criticals.
What about a feat, which allows you to replace any d20 roll by a 2d10 roll. It would be quite powerful, especially for saving throws, but not overpowered.
The reasoning could be that the character is behaving with more precision, but also without any enthusiasm. So he is very unlikely to fail, but will cetainly also not achieve overwhelming results.

 

[Jeph]

I'd probably make it more like Skill Mastery: Choose a couple skills, you can take 10 with these skills in stressful situations. I think that's one of the tallents in the Dedicated Hero's chain, too.

 

[CCamfield]

Another possibility would be a feat allowing a reroll for one skill for particularly low initial rolls (1-5, say). Probably pretty powerful, but it was just a thought.

 

[kreynolds]

Intersting idea. I'm not sure it's powerful enough to need a feat since the take 10 and take 20 rules might be easier.

Instead of 2d10', how about 10d2's?

 

[candidus_cogitens]

Thanks for your comments, everybody!

Another possibility would be a feat allowing a reroll for one skill for particularly low initial rolls (1-5, say). Probably pretty powerful, but it was just a thought.

This is not a bad idea. Jeph's suggestion is worth considering too. I'm not sure that any of these ideas is inherently better than any other. The idea is just to recognize that it makes things interesting to provide players with various ways of strategizing. Each different approach has a unique "feel," and represents something different in terms of story as well.

CCamfield's idea, for instance, has a feel that resembles one of the granted abilities for clerics. It's called something like "Luck" or "Good Fortune." It allows you to reroll one bad roll per day, as I recall. I think it would boost the average result a bit more than my proposed feat would. It also allows a much greater possibility of getting a 19 or 20, obviously. So, it feels pretty different.

Taking 10, of course, does have the effect of greater reliability--absolute reliability. But it has a very different feel, because the basic idea was that you aren't under any pressure and there is little chance involved. My "trusty skills" feat does not represent the absence of pressure, and there is still chance involved. It really represents a type of training that is focused on consistency.

I envision it being more useful for certain characters than for others. For example, it would be excellent for the Concentration skill, if you are a spellcaster. It might also work nicely for craft skills, so that you don't risk wasting a lot of money by a bad roll. With the perform skill, you could use it to avoid damaging your reputation as a solid performer. It would also be great for Pick Pocket and maybe Disguise, so that these risky undertakings wouldn't be quite as dangerous. (Of course, maybe you like the risky feel for certain skills!)

 

[Jeph]

I don't think that making 2d10 skill checks is powerful enough for a feat. It basically provides a .5 bonus to the skill roll, which is 1/4th the benefit from the infamous Skill Focus. In addition, it makes really tough checks practically impossable.

[] Now, 10d2 checks would make a lot more sense. that would be an average of 15, a +4.5 bonus to the skill roll. This seems like a good substitute for SF, and quite balanced.[/]