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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 6278845" data-attributes="member: 4937">Feat bloat is a real problem, but it isn't as if the third party solution is avoiding rules bloat.  Basically you've added another skill to the system that has non-standard and unique mechanics.  In this case, the mechanic is quite similar to having a skill which does nothing on its own but allows you to buy skill stunts.   For the cost of 1 skill point, you get a skill stunt that lets you make skill checks in one of several other knowledge skills at a high chance of success, but only if they pertain to a particular location.   The idea behind repurposing skill points being I suppose that PC's have more of them than they have feats.   But in terms of the complexity of the game, the skill stunt solution is certainly more complicated than feat bloat.  Just imagine even the bloat to the size of the stat block when someone invests 15 skill points in Knowledge Local stunts.   As far as blurring the lines between Knowledge (Local) and Gather Information, I don't see how that is possible under my solution since I've defined both out of existence (and did so like 10 years ago).   There is no such thing as 'Knowledge (Local)' in my game.  Any question you might ask about a location is covered by a different knowledge type, whether law, culture, persons, geography, history or whatever and you simply roll against that.   Any social research you might want to perform of the 'Gather Information' sort is handled by a proposition communicating where you want to go and what you want to learn, and a social skill check depending on your methodology in wanting to learn it.   Any academic research you'd want to perform (say in a library) is just essentially an assisted knowledge check of the appropriate sort.   So there is no blurring of the lines at all. And yet, Knowledge (Local) doesn't feel jumbled to you?   Gather Information doesn't feel jumbled to you?   What I really want to avoid is the problem you see in GURPS where skills are so precisely defined and yet so ununiform in their granularity that they become nonsense, so that for each specific skill you must essentially define a half-dozen alternative skills that can accomplish the same task, but at different degrees of difficulty.   So the problem with Gather Information, Profession, or Knowledge (Local) is that they don't see to define any area of knowledge exclusive to themselves.  There is no logical reason why someone with great oratorical skills and great knowledge of the law wouldn't perform well in the capacity of lawyer, and no reason why someone with profession (lawyer) should perform well in it unless they also have great oratorical skills and knowledge of the law.   Likewise, there is no reason why someone skilled in making friends, in lying, and in intimidating people to get them to do what they want and knowledgable about the area should have difficulty gathering information and finding informants, and no reason to think that someone who isn't skilled in making friends, or in lying, or in intimidating people to do what they want and who lacks any knowledge of the area should be skilled in gathering information.   You've defined more than one way to do things, which is 'skill bloat'.In many ways this is worse than 'feat bloat', as feat bloat is a problem mostly at 'compile time' where as skill bloat creates problems during 'run time' - that is, during play.The ad hoc wording of the 'Local' feat that I suggested wasn't in any way intended to be final or well thought out in every regard, but to cover the idea that I think 'Knowledge (Local)' or 'Gather Information' is trying to cover, which I think one of the 'Indiana Jones' skill sets - that of seeming to always have a contact everywhere and always seeming to understand the locality that he is in.   Other systems try to handle this by enumerating contacts or by a special power that grants you a contact everywhere, but those systems are from my experience very klunky and unsatisfying as well.   Indiana Jones presumably already has been everywhere, as a highly experienced adventurer by the time we see him, something not necessarily true of your average adventurer.   Instead, I'm trying to attack the problem from the direction of having the natural talent to become something like Indiana Jones or any other character with that chamleon like ability to just fit in.   And in the sense of 'fitting in', the feat in question was intended to broadly grant that ability.  Linguistic ability, disguise, social skills, and gathering and knowing information all are part of that.   It's no more jumbled than the idea of being an especially good sailor.   And its far less jumbled than the notion of being something core to the D&D story like 'an especially good warrior' or 'an especially good wizard', which requires lots of bloat and detail.   Whether or not it is 'worthwhile' to call on 'I'm good at fitting in' compared to 'I'm good at fighting', depends on what the experience of play at a particular table is.</blockquote>

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