Ask Wizards Response for 12/22

[Armadillo]

Yeah, it seems that there are two options in this situation:

- retraining in another skill, or
- treat the second one as providing skill focus

Allow the player to choose.

 

[Dracorat]

I think it should have at least gotten a minor mention.

A character in this scenario might benefit from retraining, however.

 

[On Puget Sound]

Is there any rule stating that a cleric can't retrain away their Religion feat? They get it at the start, but are they required to keep it?

 

[Dracorat]

Yes. It explicitly states you can't retrain away things granted by a class or race automatically.

 

[Gruns]

My houserule is that if you get a specific skill from 2 different sources, you get Skill Focus. Makes sense to us.
Later!
Gruns

 

[Khur]

I agree that the answer should mention possible retraining. However . . .

My houserule is that if you get a specific skill from 2 different sources, you get Skill Focus. Makes sense to us.

That's a cool house rule. If you don't mind, I'm going to use it as an option for my players, keeping retraining as the other option. (Actually, even if you do mind, I'm going to use it, because you'll never know . . . mwuhahahaha.)

 

[Dr_Ruminahui]

I agree that it seems an elegant solution, though I personally have troubles with a cleric becomign better at a core skill by de-specializing - seems a bit counter intuitive.

Sure, one can easily make fluff justifications for it (he gets a bigger picture of things, is one such example), but it still sits wrong with me.

That said, if it works for you, more power to you. 8)


Dr. Ruminahui - shrink with a spear

 

[JoeNotCharles]

My houserule is that if you get a specific skill from 2 different sources, you get Skill Focus. Makes sense to us.
Later!
Gruns

Careful with this. The way the Cleric skill list is worded is:

Trained Skills: Religion. From the class skills list below,
choose three more trained skills at 1st level.
Class Skills: Arcana (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Heal
(Wis), History (Int), Insight (Wis), Religion (Int)

Religion is automatically trained, but it's also in the list you can choose. I assume that's just so that it's easy to see Clerics get Religion from scanning the Class Skills list, instead of having them listed in different places, but as written, with your house rule a 1st-level Cleric could choose Religion as one of their three skills and get Skill Focus out of it.

(That hinges a it on your interpretation of "more" - does it mean "three other skills", or just "three skills"?)

 

[cmbarona]

I'd say "other." But if they really want to sacrifice a +5 for a +3, part of me wants to go ahead and give it to them. It seems like shooting themselves in the foot, though.

Perhaps limiting this overlap to "multiclassing" redundancies would do the trick.