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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 4079998" data-attributes="member: 4937">One of my favorite all time mechanics is the method of skill improvement in Chaosium Call of Cthulu.  You can only improve those skills you actually use, and the more you improve the harder it is to continue improving.  It's one of the most elegant if not the most elegant experience systems ever devised.  And, despite your argument, the skill system in 4E is nothing like it.The problem with your argument is that the 'edge case' is generally more common than the non-edge case.  That is its generally more likely that from 1st to 20th level, in most DM's campaigns, the player character would not have used the skills that are mysteriously improving than it is that they would have made alot of use of them.  In particular, skills like 'use rope' and 'appraisal' that you are using as examples, most proponents of 4E would also say are 'useless' skills that almost never came up in play.  How many swim checks are the characters really making between 1st and 20th level in most DM's campaigns if you play 3.X according to the style assumed by the core books?I won't tell you that a 20th level wizard who has been hogtied/camped/been adventuring/tying up people repeatedly over a 20 year long adventuring career is NOT naturally going to be better at Use Rope than he was at 1st level.  I will tell you that most 20th level wizards in 3.X haven't been using alot of rope and haven't been making alot of 'Use Rope' skill checks, and hense won't have any cause to be skilled in 'Use Rope'.  If in fact, the 20th level wizard had been repeatedly using rope where the results of the check mattered, thier player probably would have invested some skill points in 'Use Rope'.  Players invest skill points only in the areas that they think they are going to use, and if they have cause to believe that its important thier characters will get better at that skill.  Similarly, the career of your average 3.X character doesn't look anything like the career of Conan, and the career of your average 4E character is going to look even less like the career of Conan.  I don't think that there is any evidence that 4E is aiming for some sort of Conan versimilitude.  It's not an exageration to say that you can go from 1st to 30th level in about 3 weeks of game time in 4E.  How is that enough time to become broadly skilled at everything?At its heart, the whole argument is disingenious.  You can read the 4E rules and quite easily see that the primary reason for adopting changes to the rules was not attempting to be more realistic.  You can argue over whether or not this is a good thing.  You are quite free to believe that 4E benefits from the lack of realism.  However, if you believe that, don't hypocritically preach to me about how much more realistic the rules are.</blockquote>

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