Idea: Background Skills

[Obryn]

Because of the blandness that can happen so often with character skill selections, I'm thinking about adding the following house rule... Please try to poke holes in it, break it, etc.

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BACKGROUND SKILLS: Very few characters are born & raised as adventurers and most should have a background at doing something else. There are also some things which every character should have some experience at, just from growing up in the culture.

Every character has an extra pool of skill points equal to 2x their INT or WIS modifier (whichever is higher), with a minimum of 1 point. These skill points may be used on any Knowledge, Profession, or Craft skill, but no more than 3 may be spent on any 1 skill. They cannot be used to exceed a character's maximum skill ranks allowed by their level.
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Basically, my thought is that players can use these extra skill points to hopefully add some breadth to their character without too much cost. I'd hope these would be used for things like Profession (Cook) or Knowledge (Local) or Craft (Masonry).

-O

 

[Centaur]

I like it.

I was thinking of something similar myself. I was thinking of giving something like 10 + Wis bonus + Int Bonus total skill points for the same purpose.

I also, allow the PCs to select 3 skills that are always Class skills, no matter what their current class is. This way, even the fighter can have spot and listen as class skills if he wants.

 

[Centaur]

One of the people in my group is about to start a campaign and he is having us take 4 levels of one of the NPC classes in the DMG, like expert or warrior.

The idea is this is what we were before we became full blown PC adventurers. However, these levels are not going to reflect in our experince needed for level in any way. We will start at 0 Xp and have an ECL of 0, just like a regular character.

Should be interesting to see how it works out, although, I have my dougts...

 

[Kemrain]

I think that some bonus points to spend on the neglected background skills is a good idea. I encourage my players to spend points on skills that make sense for the character's background, not what will get the best bonuses. I do the same for my characters. But if they could have some bonus points to throw in there, which makes some sense, as you learned things when you were an 8 year old, and not a fighter, it would make for more rounded, realistic characters. In my campaign, all classes but Rogue get an additional 2 skillpoints per level. (Fighters 4, Rangers 6, etc.) But at first level, that gets spent on skills that increase survivability, not depth and character.

Perhapse I could follow your example, Obryn. I'm already looking into giving free skill ranks to characters between levels, why not before levels? Good suggestion!

- Kemrain the Over-Generous with Skill Points

 

[Obryn]

Thanks!

Honestly, I could see giving more free points at 1st level as long as they weren't used for "munchkiny" antics. Maybe 2-4 in addition to the numbers I provided above, removing the 'minimum 1' clause.

I just think it's too bad that a lot of players are discouraged from taking good, interesting, character-building skills like Craft, Profession, Knowledge: Racial Lore, and Knowledge: Local. Heck; even last time I made a Rogue, I was hard-pressed to allocate skill points to little-used skills. As a fighter or cleric, it'd be even worse.

Do you think the ability to use Wisdom instead of Intelligence for these skills (stressing hard work & diligence) is unbalancing or a bad idea in any way? (Speaking of - I like the idea of adding Int and Wis modifiers instead of just yanking the higher one and doubling it.)

I was thinking about allowing extra class skills for characters, but I eventually decided that this would be bad for game balance. The tendency would be to take the exceptionally useful skills (tumble, search, etc.), making other classes less useful. I'm happy with allowing this via Feats ... There's one in Rokugan which gives (IIRC) 2 extra class skills - I'm perfectly fine with that.

-O

 

[Steverooo]

Problems, Obryn:

I certainly don't think that ALL Knowledge skills should be allowed... Knowledge (Planes) seems an odd background skill for Non-Adventurers to have, for instance, and Knowledge (Arcana) pretty odd for anyone but a future spellslinger, too... Maybe you should limit the list a bit more.

Another idea I had (compatible with your own) is to allow X (maybe 5?) "Racial Skill Ranks". Everyone gets Knowledge (Local) for their homeland, Humans get to pick a couple, Elves and Gnomes get Knowledge (Arcana) (favored classes Wizard & Bard), and Knowledge (Nature), Craft (Alchemy), and some others. Dwarves get Craft (Armorer, Blacksmith, Stonemason, Weaponsmith), Knowledge (Architecture & Engineering), Halflings get Profession (Cook), etc., etc.

Racial Skills reflect the values of Racial upbringing, not character choice. Among Humans, the GM & Player should pick them out based upon the type of society... Barbaric ones might have Craft (Bowmaking), Craft (Weaponmaking), Survival, and Animal Handling. A civilized militaristic one might have Knowledge (Architecture and Engineering), Knowledge (History), Knowledge (Nobility), and Craft (Armorer).

Just another idea...

 

[Centaur]

expanding on Steverooo

I like the idea of racial skills as proposed by Steverooo. Aother option with this, in addition to giving some free ranks in these skills at first level, would be to make these skills even cheaper to buy at later levels. Say 2 ranks per skill point spent or something simialr. This would make it more attractive for the player to keep these skills up to some degree as he advances in level.

 

[Obryn]

I certainly don't think that ALL Knowledge skills should be allowed... Knowledge (Planes) seems an odd background skill for Non-Adventurers to have, for instance, and Knowledge (Arcana) pretty odd for anyone but a future spellslinger, too... Maybe you should limit the list a bit more.

In general, I agree - I'd have no problems limiting knowledge skills to more practical, real-world ones. I actually considered making exclusions like this, but elected not to based on the fact that it's possible someone spent their entire life as, for example, an apprentice magician. Still, it's obvious that some knowledge skills are far more game-useful than others...

I think the idea for racial skills is a good one; I'm just not sure I want to limit players' options so much. I think I'd end up making exceptions for every player whose elf or dwarf differed from the norm.

-O

 

[Bismark]

I read this in D20 Mordern, but it might apply it. It was something along the lines of, 'Your skills do not represent all the skills your character knows. Just because you don't have ranks in drive doesn't mean you can't drive a car, and you can still play games on a computer without Computer Use. They just represent the skills your character truly excells at, beyond the normal person'.

You could have background skills with little effect on game mechanics, but that could add a lot to RP.

 

[Obryn]

It's in D&D, too, Bismarck - skills with the ability for untrained use.