Class Skills vs Cross-class Skills

[small pumpkin man]

In that case, effort should be made to balance out the skills more, rather than accept an imbalance and build classes based on such an imbalance. Also, because the skills in 4E are very broad and useful (no more wastes of skill points), and because there is a lot of flexibility in the non-combat encounter system, I am not convinced that this argument is a good one. Other than the number of skills that a class gets, I think every class's skill list is merely chosen for flavor.

Sure, but skills aren't going to be perfectly balanced, a large part of the benefit of a class based system is that even if everything isn't completely balanced against everything else, it doesn't throw off the game as much, since all classes tend to have their good things and bad things. Keeping things like skills in "packets" of class skills helps to enable varied characters.

This is not a very good example. Anyone who has chosen the Perception skill will be a good scout, so a scout is anyone who has chosen the Perception skill. Not everyone who can choose Perception will do so, simply because of preferences and opportunity costs. As such, even if everyone in the party has the option of training in Perception, there will still be scouts and non-scouts.

Actually, the reason perception has been (in previous D&D games, anyway) almost always worth taking is because it's passive, and will always come up whether you like it or not, as opposed to stealth skills, which are usually only needed by the scout. I'd also like to point out that "some peoples personal preference means they wont take it" is really not a good way to balance things. Much of the point of balance in an RPG is that some people will always take what suits their concept, and balance should allow people to do this without shooting themselves in the foot or slowing down the game. I do agree however, that the consolidation of many other skills means the opportunity cost in 4e of not taking them seems to be higher.

As a whole, I am not terribly fond of enforcing class stereotypes through having class skills. I think it is an unnecessary limitation that should be avoided if at all possible. Classes are already very different based on class abilities, weapon choices, etc, and what niche protection is needed is already covered by the automatic skills that each class starts trained in. If a player wants to create a Fighter trained in Arcana, then I say he should be able to do so.

Again, I agree that the Fighter who puts effort into knowing the secrets of magical creatures should be able to get as much Arcana as, say, a Warlock who puts effort into it, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't require a greater investment for the Sword Swinger than for guy who's actually got his powers from making pacts with magical creatures.

 

[Mal Malenkirk]

This is not a very good example. Anyone who has chosen the Perception skill will be a good scout, so a scout is anyone who has chosen the Perception skill. Not everyone who can choose Perception will do so, simply because of preferences and opportunity costs. As such, even if everyone in the party has the option of training in Perception, there will still be scouts and non-scouts.

I'd point out that out of the six pregen 4e character, only the ranger is trained in perception. Obviously the rogue would have it too.

It's obviously part of their class prerogative to naturally be the best scout of the party. Someone wants to compete on their turf, they take a skill training feat (Like the wizard pregen).

 

[Stalker0]

As others have mentioned, we don't know how the skill training feat works yet.

In SAGA, you had to pick one of your class skills to become trained in. But in 4e, it could be you can pick any skill to become trained in, especially since multiclassing appears to be done using feats in 4e.

 

[TwinBahamut]

Sure, but skills aren't going to be perfectly balanced, a large part of the benefit of a class based system is that even if everything isn't completely balanced against everything else, it doesn't throw off the game as much, since all classes tend to have their good things and bad things. Keeping things like skills in "packets" of class skills helps to enable varied characters.

Well, I suppose this is true, but for me this is a question of balancing the potential gain of trying to find perfect balance, versus the potential loss of limiting character choice. In my opinion, if the skills are imperfectly balanced, but still close enough, than restricting them to certain classes in order to make it even more balanced hurts more than it helps.

Actually, the reason perception has been (in previous D&D games, anyway) almost always worth taking is because it's passive, and will always come up whether you like it or not, as opposed to stealth skills, which are usually only needed by the scout. I'd also like to point out that "some peoples personal preference means they wont take it" is really not a good way to balance things. Much of the point of balance in an RPG is that some people will always take what suits their concept, and balance should allow people to do this without shooting themselves in the foot or slowing down the game. I do agree however, that the consolidation of many other skills means the opportunity cost in 4e of not taking them seems to be higher.

I did not say that "personal preference means that they won't take it", I said that some may not take it because of opportunity cost. For example, if a team of four PCs have only three skills they can train each, and there are twelve skills available, then even if there is a slight imbalance in the balance of skills, the stronger tendency would be for each character to pick an entirely different skill set so they can cover every situation, rather than have every character pick the the same three "strong" skills. In such a party, there will still be only one scout (the player who trained perception).

Again, I agree that the Fighter who puts effort into knowing the secrets of magical creatures should be able to get as much Arcana as, say, a Warlock who puts effort into it, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't require a greater investment for the Sword Swinger than for guy who's actually got his powers from making pacts with magical creatures.

Well, suppose that the Warlock automatically gets the Arcana skill for free (a reasonable assumption, considering that the Rogue gets Stealth and Thievery automatically). In that case, a Fighter selecting Arcana as one of his limited choices of trained skills is a case of him putting a greater investment into it than the Warlock. The Warlock does not need to put a limited resource into the choice, but the Fighter does. Any kind of niche protection or direct flavor link between class concept and skills is already handled by the automatic class skills.

Also, I don't agree that any kind of flavor-based assumption or stereotype should be used to argue whether a class should get access to a skill or not. To make this more clear, why not look at skills like Insight, Streetwise, or Dungeoneering. Can you name a class for which skills like these should ever be cross-class skills? Is there a class for which the character growing up on the streets does not make sense? Is there a class where being insightful does not make sense? Is there a class where going into a dungeon does not make sense? I think, for a PC with the right story, any skill choice makes just as much sense as any other, and I don't think a PC should need to spend a feat in order to fill out details like that.

 

[breschau]

I'd like to hear some opinions on why the cross-class skill mechanic is still around.

Simple, there are two progressions of skills. Class skills progress faster than cross-class skills. It's a house rule mentioned for Saga. Cross-class progress @ 1/4 level; while class skills progress @ 1/2 class level. That way there is some distinction between when your class knows (class skills), what you're best at (trained skills), and what you don't know (cross-class skills). Yes, it can be argued that the last shouldn't get a bonus, but the reasoning is that in 4E characters are really heroes, knowing a little bit of everything.

 

[malcolm_n]

Did somebody confirm that there will be this rule? I thought all skills progressed at 1/2 level, and trained gave you +5. You could make arcana checks whenever, but being trained gives you permanent detect magic.

Am I missing something?

 

[sunrisekid]

I understand now; I was under the impression that there were still skill points to dole out. But this new arrangement is much nicer in my opinion; feels more intuitive too.

I'll definitely hold off on houseruling until I've had plenty of time to try out the rules as they are. Judging by the arguments for and against permitting players to choose any skill it seems like it won't be a game-breaker to permit this, if so desired; I'm imagining the side-effects would be minimal by doing so.

Thanks for the responses!

 

[Cadfan]

Prediction: Skill training gives you +5, and lets you count as trained in the skill. If you are already trained in the skill, you just get the +5.

Meaning that a character who is not trained in, say, Stealth, could become trained in stealth with all benefits implied by that (if any besides the +5) by taking the feat. And a character who is already trained in Stealth would get an additional +5, making him extremely stealthy.

 

[delericho]

I'd like to hear some opinions on why the cross-class skill mechanic is still around.

It breaks the game if Wizards can swim.

Seriously, though, class skills are around primarily for niche protection reasons - the big buff Fighter should have athletics and riding skills, but not extensive training in lore, while the bookish Wizard should know arcana and planar lore, but shouldn't be an expert woodsman. And so forth.

The secondary reason for the class skill division is that some skills are more powerful than others (certainly in 3e, where Tumble and Use Magic Device ruled), and limiting them to some classes prevented everyone from abusing them.

Personally, I would have vastly preferred that they balance the skills against one another better, and then allowed the player to choose whatever skills he felt best suited his character. Options, not restrictions.

 

[Lacyon]

Prediction: Skill training gives you +5, and lets you count as trained in the skill. If you are already trained in the skill, you just get the +5.

Meaning that a character who is not trained in, say, Stealth, could become trained in stealth with all benefits implied by that (if any besides the +5) by taking the feat. And a character who is already trained in Stealth would get an additional +5, making him extremely stealthy.

Stacking bonuses that large strikes me as a very bad idea. It seems much more likely that the skill training feat will just make you trained (including the +5 bonus), and then feats like Alertness will grant you a +2 to the appropriate skill along with another minor benefit.