CyberSpyder said:
Sounds...largely like semantics.
I mean, it's easy to present the skill system in precisely that way. If you spend 1 point on a skill, you have it at a level of 0. If you spend 2 points, it's at a level of 1. 4 points, a level of 2. And so forth.
When you actually use the skill, you add the attribute it's based on to your level in the skill, and you subtract a modifier based on its difficulty (0 for easy, 1 for average, 2 for hard, so forth).
Baddabing, baddaboom. Your degree of training is independent of the attribute. It's just a question of presentation.
What you're saying is that the absolute scale of skill ranks (let's use ranks, since GURPS already uses points and level for other purposes) is simply equal to how deep in a particular
column you've bought. For example:
1 skill rank costs 1/2 point
2 skill ranks costs 1 point (or an additional 1/2 point from the previous rank)
3 skill ranks costs 2 points (or an additional 1 point from the previous rank)
4 skill ranks costs 4 points (or an additional 2 points from the previous rank)
5 skill ranks costs 6 points (or an additional 2 points from the previous rank)
6 skill ranks costs 8 points (or an additional 2 points from the previous rank)
7 skill ranks costs 10 points (or an additional 2 points from the previous rank)
8 skill ranks costs 12 points (or an additional 2 points from the previous rank)
and so on.
A skill check is made by rolling less than or equal to the skill level on 3d6 (except that a roll of 17 or 18 always fails), although a particularly easy or difficult task can be modified by the GM. As the book says: "If you have a Lockpicking skill of 18, you will get most ordinary locks on the first try. But a tough lock — -8 to open — gives you an effective skill of only 10."
So, to relate this to D&D terms, a character receives development points (i.e. XP) which he can then spend to get skill ranks (i.e. experience, training, education), which combined with his innate ability (i.e. modified by the ability score) produces the chance of success (i.e. the combination of the Skill Mod and the DC) at a given task. All right, that's fine on the surface of it. With our addition of the concept of skill ranks, D&D and GURPS have roughly similar concepts even though the details of implementation are different.
As the old saying goes, though, the devil is in the details. I suppose you are right in that it's a matter of presentation. I suppose you're saying that so long as either game has a method for coming up with a chance of success that can be rolled against it's all fine and the details of presentation don't matter. I disagree. I'm particular about presentation, too, because the details of presentation say something about how the game world works. (And yes, I have some serious problems in this regard about certain D&D/d20 rules too, but none of them strike to the core of the system the way this issue with GURPS does.)
The problem I have with GURPS is that it provides no game statistic to measure "amount of training". It goes straight from development points (XP in D&D) to chance of success (Skill Level in GURPS, Skill Mod & DC in D&D) without any attempt to measure training, education, or experience in a particular skill (as opposed to generic XP). To me, any skill system worthy of the title simply
must include a measure of this. Now, such a "skill rank" concept can be retrofitted/house-ruled onto the core system, as you and I have just done, but it's not part of the core system and it should be!
A little later in the chapter, it gives a "real world" comparison of skill level to descriptive categories:
3: Astoundingly bad
6: Clumsy
9: Unskilled
12: Novice
15: Veteran
18: Expert
20: Master
25: Wizard
Note that these descriptives are applied to the skill level, which is the chance of success, and I think this is fundametally wrong. They should only be applied to the level of training/education/experience in that particular skill, which we've called "skill rank," but that concept doesn't even exist in the game mechanically!
Think about the implications of their presentation. Let's take a character with a skill of 16, and we're going to give him the minimum amount of training possible (spend 1/2 a development point) in an easy skill. That's going to give him a Skill Level of 15, which makes him equivalent to a Veteran. A character goes straight from nothing to Veteran with the application of the smallest possible unit of training! As the book says in terms of weapon skills, the smallest possible unit of skill training makes you "a good, experienced fighter. You rarely miss." I find this to be unacceptably idiotic, and since GURPS is a skill-based game this strikes to the core of the entire game and taints the whole thing for me!
Descriptions such as "novice," "veteran," or "master" should
only be applied to levels of pure training/experince and be not at all dependent on base attributes. Not all "masters" should be equal in terms of end success chance — a master with a high attribute should have a slightly better net chance for success than a master with a not-quite-so-high attribute — and it should
always take a significant amount of time and effort to achieve a "master" rating and
never take the minimal effort of 1/2 a development point. Just because you've got the best attribute value in the world shouldn't make you a near-instant master of a skill based on that attribute. I know you'll hear some people talk about "born pilots" or "instinctive swordsmen", but those things in the literal sense are non-existent myths — there might be some natural inclination that sets one novice in front of the other, but it always takes training to hone those natural inclinations into true skill.
Nobody is an instant master based on little more than gut instinct, and any skill system which allows such to happen is a pile of trash.
You may think dismissively of this as a matter of mere "presentation" or "semantics," but I think presentation and semantics are important. I get really tired of the generally dismissive and contemptuous disregard most people have for the semantics — the
meaning — of things. Meaning is important.
3catcircus said:
I think part of the problem is that J_D either doesn't see the *reason* for their choice of how they implemented their skill system, or doesn't *like* it - the question is - which of these is it?
The latter. I see the overall goal they were trying to achieve and laud the goal, but I tremendously dislike the implementation.
3catcircus said:
I happen to like the fact that it is easier for someone with a higher attribute to get a higher skill level for the same cost as someone with a lower attribute. This is realistic - it is easier for an olympic-class boxer to gain and improve boxing skills than it would be for a clumsy oaf like me - I would have to work harder and longer to gain the same level of skill as someone who was naturally better at it. Likewise, I'm sure that said olympic boxer probably would have a hard time trying to become as proficient in, say, physics or become an olympic-class speed skater, unless he or she already possessed the necessary attributes.
I don't disagree that someone with a higher attribute can get a slightly higher chance of success than someone with the same level of experience/training/education but a lower attribute. I too find that realistic. The d20 skill system implements this too with attribute mods to skill ranks, and in my opinion implements it better than GURPS does. I do believe that the degree of experience/training/education (skill ranks in D&D, unimplemented concept in GURPS) should have a greater effect on the net chance of success than the attribute, something which D&D accomplishes and GURPS doesn't. I don't mind that skills are divided into three or four categories of difficulty and more difficult skills are harder to advance in than less difficult skills, something which GURPS does better than the D&D class and cross-class skills. See my words above to CyberSpyder for what I object to.
