Learning new languages

[Snowman]

First of all hello everyone, new member as you can see

What I want to know is, how many Skill Points does a character have to spend to learn a new language?

I've searched all the books I have from top to bottom, and the official FAQ, but just can't seem to find it. I know it costs 2 points for a barbarian to become literate in a language he can already speak so it has to be more than this but just how much?

1 point seems somewhat insignificant for something that is quite difficult to do in real life, but when you bring it past that players become reluctant to bother if they've any other way around the problem. Can anyone help me out here?

cheers,
Dav

 

[android]

1 point per language for bards.
2 points per language for the other classes, with some barbarian exceptions.

The explanation for this: there is a speak language skill. however, you never make a speak language check, so it's sort of strange in that sense. anyways. every rank in this skill represents another language your character knows. speak language is a class skill for bards and cross-class for everyone else.

hope that helps.

 

[Snowman]

Thanks for the suggestion, and although I see where you're coming from this just seems a little too good to be true.

Say you spend 1 point on Craft (Blacksmithing), Disguise or Tumbling...not counting any modifiers for high stats, you can barely make nails, impersonate yourself (!) or do a backflip without getting lucky, yet for the same 1 point you become completely fluent and literate in a hitherto unknown language.

Does that seem a little silly to anyone else?

At the same time I stand by my previous statement that if it costs much more than this no-one will want to learn them. Is this one of those "forget logic and move on" things?

 

[android]

Is this one of those "forget logic and move on" things?

In the end, it doesn't have to be, but it's probably easier that way. Speaking extra languages is nice, but it's not *that* great. Comprehend languages is a first level spell and it lets you understand just about anything. Tongues is only a little higher in level and you can speak it too. Changing the mechanics on it is certainly an option. However, unless it's posing a problem in your campaign (such as every PC has 10 different languages), I wouldn't worry too much about it.

If you're searching for more realism to be included, you can always require some sort of reasoning or roleplaying behind the acquisition of new languages. It's not really possible to learn a new language without exposure to it. No one wakes up one morning and suddenly knows how to speak a foreign language. Make them earn it with roleplaying and the commitment of some of their character's time, rather than skill points.

 

[Snowman]

Aye, I guess that'll do...the role-playing element was always going to be present in my game anyway but as you say, with those spells so easily available there's no point in making it cost any more than 1 or 2 SP.

Besides, this leaves room for a thriving sub-industry of translators, most of whom will probably be working for their own guild or for the thieves guild, and makes plenty of room for fun and treachery

 

[Henry]

Some other d20 games have separate skills for each language, and you must put points into them. However, for D&D, this level of simplicity is fine, especially since most PC's have low skill point resources to put into separate languages.

Keep two things in mind:

First, D&D was built for consistency of game rules. Logic on how things can be applied is up to each GM. What matters is that the rule set supports it.

Second, DM's can handle it in many ways: They can assume the PC was learning the rudiments of the language in the background, they can REQUIRE the player to mention that he's been studying it up to a whole level in advance, and make him roleplay it out, or the DM can simply state that you cannot take ANY skill you have not been exposed to.

This last option stops those instances of having a PC with no ranks in sailing, who takes one level of rogue, spends ALL his points in sailing, and has instantly maxed out his ranks in sailing skill in the time it took to level - compared to the other PC who took sailing at first level and maxed it out every single level.

My advice is to rationalize it in whatever way seems best for your campaign. The core rules, however, should work consistently without interference from logic and realism.