Have "cross-class" skill deliniations finally been removed?

[Emirikol]

Have "cross-class" skill deliniations finally been removed? Anybody know why they would bother to keep that 'rule'?

jh

 

[delericho]

I believe these are gone in Star Wars Saga Edition. Certainly, I hope they're gone from D&D 4e as well.

I'd also quite like them to get rid of trained and untrained skills, as well, but I think that's a rather more controversial decision.

 

[Emirikol]

I believe these are gone in Star Wars Saga Edition. Certainly, I hope they're gone from D&D 4e as well. I'd also quite like them to get rid of trained and untrained skills, as well, but I think that's a rather more controversial decision.

What makes it controversial? I'm of the mindset that if it's "trained" maybe they should just give a +5 to the base for particular classes and save a whole page of charts and unnecessary rules text in the PHB. That chart and the cross-class skill chart could easily be eliminated.

jh

 

[Derren]

I hope cross class skills stay in 4E. They make 3E skills at least a little bit realistic.

 

[Elemmakil]

I have seen no indication that they are gone, but I can hope.

More often than not, I found them completely illogical in that many of them (Spot, Listen, Heal, most of the atheltic skills, etc) didn't have much to do with the classes. Why does a pickpocket have an easier time learning to play the flute than a warrior? Why does a thief have a better spot skill than a guard? Some of them (chiefly Use Magic Device and maybe Spellcraft) would have been better as class abilities rather than skills, and I'm not completely sure what I would do with the stealth skills (probably now one skill), because these really should be specific to some classes. Other than that, I want class skills gone.

 

[Will]

Personally, I like cross-class skills, particularly with feats to add exceptions (I can always train these skills because of my background).

Trained/untrained always made sense to me. I mean, if you have no training in smithing, how well are you going to make a sword? Or playing a lute?

There are lots of skills where even a minimum of training allows you to do things that an untrained person simply can't. And then there are skills that anyone can do (like Spot), but training enhances greatly.


I'm one of the conservatives on the skill issue, and am pretty happy with how skills work in 3.5e. I'm totally on board with combining skills, but some of the other indications make me nervous.

 

[SteveC]

If it is like Star Wars Saga, then they're gone. Saga Skills are either "trained" or "untrained." If you have a skill on your trained list, you can learn it, and if it isn't, you simply can't, unless you multiclass.

While this works fairly well for Star Wars, I'd hope there would be a mechanic to learn skills that aren't on your class' list for D&D.

--Steve

 

[jonrog1]

It's also worth noting the SAGA implementation of "trained only" uses of skills -- that is, there are things you can do with a trained skill that you can;t do with an untrained skill check. This folded very precise skills into broader skills in a way that made sens and stopped you fomr having to train an entirely separate skill in order to accomplish something that came up very rarely in game-time.

Although I prefer skill points myself, I can still admire the mechanism and agree it's appropriate for 99% of games.

 

[delericho]

What makes it controversial?

In theory, the 'trained only' uses of a skill can just be modelled by increasing the DC for the check. Especially when combined with the rule that a 20 is not an auto-success on skill checks, this places complex operations of skills out of reach of the untrained.

However, it does run afoul of some simulation issues, where some tasks are considered easy for a person with the appropriate training, but which are nigh-impossible without it (actually, reading springs to mind). This may or may not be considered important enough to worry about.

Perhaps of more concern is the "Aid Another" action. As long as this has a flat DC 10 check to provide a flat +2 bonus, we need the 'trained only' uses. Otherwise, I could reliably provide assistance to a doctor performing brain surgery, despite my utter lack of medical training.

 

[Matthias]

I like the distinction of class skills versus cross-class skills. It's called flavor.

Same thing for trained-only versus usable-untrained.

Would it be any fun if all classes had exactly the same strengths and weaknesses?

For the same reasons, the news of level-based BAB and save progressions being the same for all classes disturbs me.