Other ways to solve skills?

Danyael

First Post
Come on! There's gotta be another way to solve skills...

d20 does it by adding ranks + mod + misc.
Gurps and AD&D 2E set the difficulty according to your attribute (and other systems too)
Shadowrun, Storyteller, etc. Attribute + "Skill" = Number of dice that blah blah blah.

Any other way that I'm missing?
 

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Ad Hoc, Diceless, cards... not these things!! Come on! I just had lunch!

"I roll Diplomacy"
"Yeah, ok, you got 19, so... you killed the guy?"
 

In OD&D we just described exactly what we were doing, sometimes demonstrating if necessary (... and then I jump out from behind the door and backstab him like this! Oops, sorry if that hurt ...) and left success to DM whim modified by loud arguments and enticing bribes.
 

I don't think that there will ever be a publication that contains a section called "how to bribe the GM". Its mechanics would be extensive.

No, seriously, I've been looking for different ways to roll the dice, and skills need another approach. The problem is that I think there isn't a new way for it.
 

Another classic way of handling it is 'roll d20 to get underneath your skill' (the Bushido method, which could also be seen as a d20-isation of the original Runequest method). It has the advantage of working quickly and cleanly in most situations, and in opposed checks see who has beaten their target number by the highest amount (a functionally equivalent variant with simpler maths is that the highest roll that is still underneath their skill level wins a contest).

Cheers
 


Savage Worlds does a pure skill roll, your attribute is not added. Instead, your attribute determines how expensive it is to raise your skill.
 


Seventh Sea has an interesting variation wherein the number of dice you roll is equal to attribute + skill, but you only get to keep attribute's worth. It works a bit like the 4d6 drop one for D&D ability generation in that it alters the probibility curve without affecting the range of results.
 

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