D&D 5E (2014) L&L Sept 16th . The Latest on Skills

[Li Shenron]

The one positive thing about this, as I see it, is they want to get rid off attack bonus by class.

Remains to be seen, but IMHO it would be a good thing.

Unlike skills, where there is little reason for someone who never does X to get better automatically like in 4e, attacks are a much more generic expertise so it's quite ok for me if all PCs advance in BAB. The difference is in weapon proficiency (i.e. damage output) and additional abilities of the martial classes, but with everyone sharing the same BAB progression there is full support for the non-martial PC who wants to pick up one good weapon proficiency and swing a sword adequately (tho she won't have the additional abilities of martial types).

Furthermore, there is a very good aid to the multiclassing rules, because one shared BAB means we need no specific rules for stacking BAB, we can just use the BAB for the total character level.

Yikes. They keep killing things I liked about previous packets..

Fields of lore
Expertise dice
Martial dice

For starters..

Expertise dice and Martial dice are (or can be) still in the game, but since they are moved to subclasses, nobody is forced to use them.

This is a very good move IMO, because while I absolutely loved the first Fighter with Combat Superiority, it does add complexity... Turning it from class feature to subclass feature means everybody can choose to have it or not.

You can convert the proficiency bonus to a proficiency die: +2 -> d4, +3 -> d6 ... +6 -> d12. I guess, that's why the bonuses stop at +6.

This sounds like a good idea! Flat bonus if you like simplicity & reliability, bonus dice if you want more swinginess.

Similarly to rolling hit points, I could totally see myself allowing either method to each player. Or why not even to the same player, depending on circumstances.

I really like the changes, but I got to say that 5e feels kike 2e updated with the best parts of 3e and 4e, plus a few original ideas like advantage.

I think this was pretty much one of the their goals

Well, I like that the skill die has gone away, the untethering of skills from attributes, and the use of consistent bonuses for all skills (which makes the untethering not require a bunch of lookups).

IMHO the skill dice was actually an experiment in order to open up the possibility of "skill tricks". It wasn't bad, and we might see it as an optional module or subclass feature for example of a Rogue's "Trickster" subclass. OTOH it was quite useless when used without such tricks!

Untethering skills from attributes is something I really want, even if they insist on having one explicit default attribute. I can settle for a couple of lines in the Skills chapter telling that you can apply the bonus to other ability checks if relevant.

 

[Minigiant]

The one positive thing about this, as I see it, is they want to get rid off attack bonus by class.

Yeah, I think somewhere Mearls or Wyatt said everyone would get the same base bonus to weapons. So clerics, fighters, rogues, and mages all get +2 to hit at level 1. It is just that fighters will have higher Strength and Dexterity most likely and have more damaging weapons.

This would make this weird thing where a high Str cleric w/ a mace or a high Dex rogue or wizard w/ a dagger could have higher to hit than many fighters.

And making fighters experts and giving them +5 would be too much.

 

[TerraDave]

as of right now...the link works, but otherwise I cannot find this on the D&D page anywhere.

can skills be that sensitive?

 

[TerraDave]

Actually, its too bad its hidden, as I really liked the article and it resolved many of my main remaining issues with Next.

Wonder if it will actually be in the packet, which I am sure we will get any minute now.

 

[TwoSix]

This sounds like a good idea! Flat bonus if you like simplicity & reliability, bonus dice if you want more swinginess.

I hope that for the final product, they take a page from 13th Age and add lots of sidebars discussing possible ways to modify the various subsystems.

 

[tuxgeo]

Overall, I like this latest L&L article very much, as might be expected.

Specific points:
"Skills in core, but easy to ignore": Brilliant! That makes the arithmetic work, while it simplifies the game at the same time.

"Skills can be applied where they fit" (even to some foreign ability score if the story works): Very good. Yeah, if there's a way to use Athletics with Wisdom (which the article gives as an example), the freedom to go for it helps to make the game less of a straightjacket.

"Proficiencies in place of skills": Okay. I could get used to that.

"Short skill list": Very familiar in recent years.

"The . . . system allows anyone to attempt anything": That's one of the key goals, isn't it? I was a bit worried that achieving that goal might be difficult to accomplish at the same time as a few other goals.

Side-note: Many have wished that wizards could be better healers, and now they can: the "Medicine" skill is now based on INT, not on WIS. Are arcanists now going to be better nurses than clerics? Could a melee cleric be bad at first aid? This should be interesting. . . .

 

[Kraydak]

So a level 20 character is rolling at +5 (4 proficiency, 1 stat) over an optimized level 1 character, and loses opposed rolls quite frequently? Yay? Or something...

 

[GravyFingerz]

I'm really disappointed, but they tried to meet part of the way between no skills and yes skills, so it isn't a total loss. At least it sounds like new DMs and players can ignore skills if they wish.

 

[Remathilis]

Finally! Now, rogue's have a purpose beyond Sneak Attack!

Looking over the list, it looks like Stealth, Sleight of Hand, Acrobatics (tumble/balance), Acrobatics(jump/climb) Search (find traps?) and Perception (listen/spot) are all skills, while remove traps/open locks are probably handled via thief tool proficiency. Depending on how skills are dolled out, a rogue can have the traditional thief skills again! Add on Expert bonus (probably a +5 to all dex skills and tools) and you have a skill-monkey character reborn!

 

[zoroaster100]

Overall it sounds ok, and much better than doing away with skills from the core game altogether. Except for the Expert Bonus of +5, which sounds way too high compared to the other bonuses and will skew the DCs too much to make it either too easy for experts or too hard for everyone else. I think a +2 or +3 is enough for rogues, or rangers, etc. to have an edge in their areas of expertise, when overall bonuses are so scarce.