A conglomeration of alternate skill advancement ideas

[Vrecknidj]

You could just change the DC progression so that it's geometric instead of linear.

Dave

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

Geometric progression would make the whole skill point problem worse. As it is now, players think they have to focus totally on a sub-set of skills in order to be effective.

The two options I am looking at are putting a flat cap on skills, per Afrodyte, and/or having cross class skills cost 1 point {but still with the lower dice cap}

This should result in more rounded characters who are capable of a spread of skills sets.

 

[Kealios]

Also, I recommend that when you make a check, you do not "erase" the time spent. Have the character make a roll every set amount of time (week, day, whatever), if they succeed, good for them, they get the next skill rank. If they fail, their next check gains a cumulative +1 bonus. Thus, eventually a character will have to succeed, otherwise that poor player who can't seem to manage to roll more than a 5 when he needs it, will never improve, which from a players perspective sucks.

I think that's a good idea, and likely better than the one I had proposed. Actually, it makes alot of sense, as it still requires the initial investment of time, but doesnt unduly make the learning of skills prohibitive.

Do you require training for leveling, feats, etc.? If not, why suddenly get characters to train for skills and not these other things?

Is down time common in your games? If not, it could really suck for players to have leveled once or twice, and be unable to improve at any of the skills until they get to sit out for months at a time.

Do you want to encourage down time?

I currently do not require training for leveling and feats. This skill idea is for a future campaign of mine, as I dont like springing new things on my players unexpectedly. I have perceived some issues with skills currently, and am looking for a solution.

Downtime is not common, but it happens. This would encourage downtime, certainly, but I feel that there is a lot of downtime in most games that isnt accounted for (ie travel for 8 hours, camp/hang out for 8 hours, sleep for 8 hours, etc). Sure, there is no mechanic in the game to account for this "extra" down time, but there really isnt a mechanic to deal with this skill issue either

How long does it take for your characters to generally level? If it's a decent amount of time, don't you consider the time they've spent gaining experience to advance to the next level amounts to the training to gain another rank in the skills they use?

My players get a really good amount of xp per game month, I believe. Per-session isnt always the highest, but one or two good encounters here and there really bumps up the overall advancement. The game has taken place from roughly October to February so far (5 months-ish), and the players have gone up from 5th to 13th on average. Thats not quite but almost 2 levels per month. And yes, some of the time they have spent would be applicable in gaining skills in this method. Other skills, especially ones not used heavily in the game, would not be available as readily.

[/QUOTE]Why do you think it will make skills "worth" more?

Will your players enjoy this system?

Will it cause more/less hassle in your gaming group?[/QUOTE]

Skills would be worth more to the players under this system because they had to "work" for them. Gaining a level and erasing one number to put in another wouldnt be as rewarding as knowing you passed a difficult learning check to advance something you really wanted.

Do I think the players would like this system? Likely not. I think they'd be game for it, because I have a great set of players, but there would be some chaffing. And the hassle would increase, certainly.

However, sometimes its not what the players want (although without them, there would be no game!), but what the DM feels is needed to balance the perception of brokenness in any given campaign.

Since starting this thread, I have done some browsing on this website and on others, and have really worked at making a list of what Knowledge skills can and cannot do. They seem to be my bane the most, as I have already discarded the Diplomacy skill RAW and use the one from the link above. I now have a better understanding of ways to increase the DC of knowledge skills in a legitimate manner, and have somewhat come to terms with the fact that a player who sinks so many skillpoints into one skill really DOES want to know everything about everything I am hoping by my system, however, to incourage diversity and not have excessively-high skill checks making my life as a DM so difficult *heh*

Personally, I wouldn't want to play in a game with this rule, I find that if you want to have a character train, do it only for a week upon leveling (or at worst, a week per new character level, upon leveling), not a week for each skill.

This also penalizes rogues and others with a high number of skills, more than the low-skill point masses. They are supposed to be good at what they do, and that is skills.

I dont have a problem with players being good at what they want to do. I have a problem with the DC RAW because after level 10, it becomes exceedingly difficult to challenge players because their skill checks simply let them dance around obstacles.

For instance:

My cleric/wizard Theurgist PC has a +26 on his Know (arcana) and (religion). He is level 16, so is pretty near the top himself...but I cant fool him with new monsters very often, because he rolls his d20, gets a 35+ on most rolls (46 max...ouch), and says something like, "Well, I probably knew this monster's forefathers at one point!" So...the new monster that I spent the previous two evenings making has some of its mystery removed because it happened to be an undead.

Also...the players are fighting a cult who claim that Pelor has a dual nature, one good and one bad. This player joined my campagin a few months after it had started, and with well-made Knowledge checks (combined with his personal knowledge which he only applied if he could make the appropriate Know checks, thankfully), had the case 90% broken open within the first month. Now they are moving about the continent removing the cult, which is good, but the player continually complains that even with his ungodly skills, he still cant know more than he does. Basically, I dont want to give the whole storyline away, and the major NPC has still not been revealed to them, and I dont want him to be uncovered yet, so yea, maybe in that sense I have limited him, but I dont want skillchecks spoiling the fun.

This is why I have issues with DC's. Skill DCs like knowledge and diplomacy RAW, and poison DC's cause theyre increadibly low and useless, are my issues, and I am interested in changing their impact on the game. I dont have the answers yet, but I feel that I am close.

Thanks all,
keep em coming

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

Those particular skills are a bit different..

The fix to Diplomancy is well covered with Rich Burley's rules.. and with "Demagogues and.." {I can never remember the name of that book..}

Poisen DC's are low as a 'fun' factor. It sucks to have your character die from a snake bite.. even tho its realistic. A partial fix to this is Sean Reynolds variant poisen rules. The game designers probably also wanted to aviod the 'Poisen his food, its the only way to be sure' method of play. When you have a means of taking out the opposition that is highly effecitve, it gets used more and more.

Knowledge skills are... really difficult. There are some checks that should be impossible. An example is the Know(critter) check you mentioned. When a new creature appears, by creation or planar travel, nobody should be able to get much beyond a physical description... no matter how high your skill check is. Figure in a +40 'never been seen before' modifier to the DC
The thing to remember with them is, for the most part, Know represents book learning. This sort of check will never identify the leader of a cult, nor even the location of cult members. It could let teh characters know that they are dealing with Cult X and some about the Cults beleifs and tactics.
For finding them, Gather Info, Diplomancy, Bluff, and a potential adventure awaits the group. Digging into the political landscape of Guilds, Houses, Nobles, and fanatics can earn the party some enemies.

The biggest thing to remember is that your are dealing in a world were books tend to be rare, no internet.. no scientific journals. Unfortunately, adding the level of granularity to the know check systems slows down games. A recent thread on identifying creatures does a good job on the subject for that specific peice of the skill.
Another thing to remember is to provide the information *in character*.

The Flarbuarge is a tremendous creature, standing twice as tall as you. Lean and lanky, its moss colored skin hangs about its thin frame with patches of hair sticking out.. springing thicker from the dark warts that infest it. Its hands are bony and look as if they are designed for ripping flesh apart. Its canine teeth gleam sharply from within its thin lips. Flarbuarge's live in dark, dank areas, prefering the edges of fetid swamps, and hunt in the twilight for easy prey. They are very resiliant creatures and heal from wounds very fast unless their flesh is cauterized by either fire or acid. Be warned, Flarbuarge's are intelligent and fast. Many an explorer has been ripped in half by thier terrible strength!

As to learnign checks.. I agree with having extra weeks provde a chance to recheck with a culmative +1.. however, if you are rolling then there should be a chance to fail. Perhaps a roll of 10 less than the DC means the character cannot learn more about this skill until after the next adventure.
This is partly because yoru system can eaily degenerate to 'roll to see how long it takes you to finish leveling up.
I use a rule of 1 month per character level for training. This artificially slows advancement in the game calendar, avoiding the 14th level in one year problem. My group recently reached 4th level.. and that has spanned 10 months of game time. It also forces the group to worry about mundane issues like paying for living expenses between adventures {an opportunity to leech some of thier money away }
I try to avoid leveling mid adventure.. but have been forced to do so as my 9 player group averages 4 who can make a given session. In this case I allow the 'automatic' increases, but leave skills and feats for when the party can train up.
Gotta hate it when I find the encounters almost slaughtering the party cause I forgot to scale them back down

 

[The Druid Merlin]

I like the idea of tying skills more to abilities, though I think it should be times three, not times two.

 

[Nifft]

I'm working on a system of geometric progression, together with lower base DCs (and lower equipment bonuses).

Such a system would have the nice side effect of making Skill Focus actually desirable at high levels.

With standard d20, I'd start just handing out a few free ranks in stuff they end up doing, like after a mountain climbing adventure, "by the way, as you level up, all of you get two free ranks in Climb". Or Profession(Sailor) if they just got back from a sea voyage. Etc.

Once they've got a few ranks, their mono-mania will work against them! Mua-ha-ha-ha-ha!

-- N