New WotC Article - The Role of Skills

[I'm A Banana]

Personally -- and this idea is a little weird -- I'd kind of like to see a return to "secondary skills:" a profression I can get that says "I am good at doing things related to X."

So my secondary skill might be "Sailor." Or "Forester." Or "Soldier." Or "Noble." Or "Blacksmith." Or "Thief." Or somesuch. then, I get a bonus to my skill checks when I can relevantly apply (with DM judgement) that secondary skill.

I kind of like it because it's simple and flexible, while still being fairly difinitive, but I am not certian it's not too broad.

 

[Scribble]

Personally -- and this idea is a little weird -- I'd kind of like to see a return to "secondary skills:" a profression I can get that says "I am good at doing things related to X."

So my secondary skill might be "Sailor." Or "Forester." Or "Soldier." Or "Noble." Or "Blacksmith." Or "Thief." Or somesuch. then, I get a bonus to my skill checks when I can relevantly apply (with DM judgement) that secondary skill.

I kind of like it because it's simple and flexible, while still being fairly difinitive, but I am not certian it's not too broad.

I actually could support this. It would also let them tie "secondary skills" into themes and such.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

If the mechanical tricks aren't enshrined in the skills system anymore, you only need three skills: let characters pick a pillar they get a +3 or so bonus to, let them fluff it however they want (Bluff? Diplomacy? Insight? Whatever, it's all of them), and call it a day.

You're onto something there. You could conceivably use it to allow players to customize their character's aptitude in each pillar, or to focus on one. What if you had a system like:

Social:
Schmoozing
Conning
Bullying

Exploration:
Orienteering
Trap-monkeying
Pit-jumping

Combat:
Tactics
Medic
Stunts

And then you get to "Pick Three" so you can take one from each Pillar, or focus on one pillar, or two-and-one.

I'm mostly just making this up for discussions sake (as evidenced by my silly skill-names.)

 

[Sammael]

This sentence alone:

Since ability checks will handle the resolution system that has been handled by skills in the last two editions, skills still need to be relevant in the game both as the means by which you customize your character and as a mechanic that reflects your increased competence as a result of that customization.

is sufficient for me to not want to touch 5E with a 10' pole. Because, you see, in MY GAMES, I will never, ever handle the resolution system by means of ability scores alone. It's simply unacceptable. Ability scores are, in the grand scheme of things, only one component if you're trying to have at least a semblance of verisimilitude in the game.

Please, Rodney, tell me you mis-wrote that sentence. Please tell me that 5E will have an option to not use ability checks for everything.

 

[Ahnehnois]

I'll repeat my older post on the issue:

I'd really like to see skill trees. You take your first five ranks (or thereabouts) in general academic knowledge, and then from there on out you have to specialize, taking specific ranks for History, Arcana, Geography, etc. You take your first give ranks in acrobatics, and then specialize in Tumble or Balance. You take your first five in influence, and then specialize in Bluff or Diplo or Intimidate. It would allow for a lot more detail and robustness without clogging the character sheet, and it would make the game easy for beginners at 1st level while retaining the detail for more advanced players as they move up the ladder. It would allow a concrete list of general skills, while making it easy for DM's to make up subspecialties of them as needed. That's modularity in practice.

And I'll add that to this point, I think there should be a very consolidated list of around 20 skills that cover almost everything (much more so than the existing D&D skill systems) and that they should have an option to specialize that allows players and DMs to make up as many subspecialized skills as they want.

 

[Rhenny]

I love the idea of using ability as the base with specializations that span a huge variety with levels of proficiency +3/+5/+8. I'm all for anything that makes it easier to improvise and get players to try doing heroic and interesting actions in the game. The open ended nature of such a system would allow DMs and players more creative license, bravo!

 

[Minigiant]

I'd go for tiers of competence.

Untrained +0 (completely reliant on natural ability)
Trained +3 (Some competence added to nature)
Skilled +5 (the is when skill matches maximum starting ability mod)
Master +X (This equal to the maximum ability mod after the first level basee boost)

Grandmaster +Y (the mod of a max stat all points to this ability preepic character)

 

[mach1.9pants]

I like -X/+0/not possible if untrained, with not possible for things such as reading for the illiterate and the -X for very tricky skills if untrained. Then the +3 (trained), +5 and +8. ANd an unlimited skill list, just make it up with your DM. Obviously a lot of example skills (all those included in every PHB) should be in the book to help with the beginners and give ideas.

 

[tlantl]

Personally -- and this idea is a little weird -- I'd kind of like to see a return to "secondary skills:" a profression I can get that says "I am good at doing things related to X."

So my secondary skill might be "Sailor." Or "Forester." Or "Soldier." Or "Noble." Or "Blacksmith." Or "Thief." Or somesuch. then, I get a bonus to my skill checks when I can relevantly apply (with DM judgement) that secondary skill.

I kind of like it because it's simple and flexible, while still being fairly difinitive, but I am not certian it's not too broad.

Wouldn't you think this is what character themes would be for?

My take on the system would have your background knowledge and associated skills set as part of your character's theme, such as merchant, sailor, ships pilot, etc. Each theme could come with a set of skills that pertain to it which give a theme bonus toward using them.

I could be way off in this but it seems plausible.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I also wouldn't mind a hybrid of what they have discussed along with a limited version of different breadths of skills.

So you have skills like "Skullduggery" or "Handy" or "Artistic" or "Mysticism". These are very broad, and thus apply in a lot of situations. There is even deliberately some overlap. I'd prefer that these give situational "advantage" more readily than the character making up a reason, but they could also give a straight bonus, where relevant, in a pinch.

So a character goes to manipulate a trap. This is a Dex check (against some Hard DCs, because traps are hard untrained. A character that has general training in Skullduggery or Handy has, or can quite easily get, a bonus to that roll, whereas "Artistic" can't.

On an orthogonal dimension, you also have maybe around nine broad terrain skills (city, sea, woods, jungle/swamp, desert, arctic, mountain, caves, plains). Having one of these helps out when in that terrain, for hunting, foraging, stealth, movement, etc.

Then for a third broad dimension, divide up cultural/social bits somehow, either broad racial/cultural dimensions by campaign (e.g. particularly broad elven culture in a given continent, all the races of a certain empire, etc.) or perhaps on a flat noble, merchants, yeoman, peasant, clergy, etc. type of mix.

The three categories of broad skills are important, because they are allowed to stack effects across dimensions, but not within. Having "Skullduggery" or "Handy" means something with traps, but that doesn't stack, because its basically the same thing. However, having "Handy" and "Caves" as a dwarf does make it easier for you to deal with a stone trap, than having either by itself.

Broad skills are explicitly discussed in the rules, with some notes on what they cover and where they fall short (i.e. boundaries). These are relatively hard to get, and represent a large amount of time spent doing a wide range of practical things, recently. If your character spent his early years as a forestor apprenctice, then you might have "Woods" and "Yeoman"--with all the bonuses those entail. A wizard apprentice that grew up 70 years ago in civilization but has been a hermit for the last 20 years in the desert would have replaced his earlier "Civilization" with "Desert". Note that not everyone has a terrain skill. A character that traveled all over might have more of the cultural/social skills instead.



Broad skills are the first modular layer that sits on top of nothing but ability checks. From here you can go one of two ways (mostly compatible with each other due to balancing concerns):

• These broad skills are the skill system, because you want to paint with a broad brush all the time. This is more "impressionistic", narrative play--or sometimes mild simulation on top of an otherwise gamist campaign. Characters definitely get a flat bonus from their broad skills, and this can increase gradually with some still limited skill picks. (The tiered competence mentioned in the poll would be good here, albeit with smaller numbers than +3, +5, +8).
• Or, the broad skills stay flat, and preferably represent chances to get situational advantage. Then you have more specific skills, which give the straight bonuses. That is, you can layer "Lockpicking" on top of "Skullduggery" or "Handy" to be really good with locks. In this case, one (broad or specific) provides the tiered bonus, and the other provides circumstantial advantage easily, multiple dice, faster resolution, etc. This is for more simulationist play. Accordingly, there are examples listed of specific skills, but you are encouraged to make the list more coarse or fine as it suits you.

Most of the time, characters will have no more than one or two operative skills for any given check, and these will be apparent. I'm trying to bargain with the town mayor, and I've either got "Merchant" or "Noble" or I don't. I've either got some specific trading skills, or I don't. Occasionally, everything lines up perfectly, and your "Mountain", "Sneak", "Beastmaster" combo makes sneaking up on a mountain ape particularly easy for you.