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<blockquote data-quote="Janx" data-source="post: 6474451" data-attributes="member: 8835">I think this is related to my point, which i guess didn't have traction.In 3e, you get X skill points.&nbsp; You can spend them anywhere, but you are basically going to go max-ranks on every skill you can, rather than spread the load.&nbsp; Which in turn causes you to narrowly select the skills you think will be useful most of the time, along the adage of &quot;it's OK if I don't have social skills, I can light it on fire&quot;I propose that a design might be interesting to give skill points by category.&nbsp; You get 5 points in Combat, Social, Knowledge and Trade respectively.Which means the PC will have a social skill of some kind.&nbsp; And a Knowledge skill.Though I think the min/max problem would still exist that a player would rather maximize one skill in a given category, than spread out the points across many skills because that diversity will be a bunch of skills the PC is still too low in to be useful.&nbsp; Better to excel in something, and use that whenever you can or to barter with for an NPC with the skill you lack.&nbsp;So&nbsp; PC would maximize their &quot;Intimidate&quot; and use that contantly, rather than daintily attempt a Diplomacy with 1 point, knowing they'll fail that, and every other social skill they put 1 point in.I wonder if the design flaw is in thinking that people suck at almost everything except what they specialized in.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Janx, post: 6474451, member: 8835"] I think this is related to my point, which i guess didn't have traction. In 3e, you get X skill points. You can spend them anywhere, but you are basically going to go max-ranks on every skill you can, rather than spread the load. Which in turn causes you to narrowly select the skills you think will be useful most of the time, along the adage of "it's OK if I don't have social skills, I can light it on fire" I propose that a design might be interesting to give skill points by category. You get 5 points in Combat, Social, Knowledge and Trade respectively. Which means the PC will have a social skill of some kind. And a Knowledge skill. Though I think the min/max problem would still exist that a player would rather maximize one skill in a given category, than spread out the points across many skills because that diversity will be a bunch of skills the PC is still too low in to be useful. Better to excel in something, and use that whenever you can or to barter with for an NPC with the skill you lack. So PC would maximize their "Intimidate" and use that contantly, rather than daintily attempt a Diplomacy with 1 point, knowing they'll fail that, and every other social skill they put 1 point in. I wonder if the design flaw is in thinking that people suck at almost everything except what they specialized in. [/QUOTE]

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