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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8569860" data-attributes="member: 42582">[USER=7030413]@c22system[/USER] It seems to me that skills are a form of player-side resource, typically used to buff the chance of success at a certain category of actions. In a tabletop RPG the relationship between a particular skill and the category of actions that it buffs is established by real people engaged in conversation with one another using natural language descriptors and applying them informally or (perhaps) semi-formally (eg by using lists of examples, canonical definitions, etc).In your example, the relevant categories of actions are described by results - like distract someone or make someone well-disposed towards you - and hence if you already have skills like Bluff or Manipulate or Persuade or Impress that link to those categories, Performance seems redundant. And hence a trap for players.There are other approaches to describing the relevant categories, which might produce a different conclusion. I'm thinking here of Classic Traveller, which describes actions related to technology not in terms of results (like get quickly from A to B) but in terms of the equipment used - and so Electronics is a different skill from Mechanical is a different skill from Computing (which deals with software, not hardware) is a different skill from Engineering (which deals with nuclear-based power systems).If we used the Traveller approach to social skills then we might have a Performance skill - you do your social stuff using performing arts - and Words skill - you do your social stuff by talking. Performance has the downside you need your instrument, or everyone has to be quiet as you recite your verse, etc. Words has the downside that the audience really needs to be able to follow what you're saying (so languages and dialects matter), probably make eye contact, etc.I don't think there's any unique or "magic" solution to how to carve up the descriptor-space so as to achieve a rough parity and lack of redundancy among the options. Some of it is about what we want a particular game to do and how we want it to feel; and some of it is a little bit arbitrary and will actually contribute to the distinctive feel and play of the game.I've recently been reading and playing a bit of Torchbearer, and thinking about its skill system. It doesn't follow any particular hard logic in its descriptors and categories - eg one skill is Armourer (everything to do with making and repairing armour and weapons - ie the relevant category is defined by material outputs) and another is Fighter (trying to kill beings or drive them off in one-on-one or small group combat - ie the relevant category is defined by a goal which is rather gerrymandered by reference to standard FRPG conventions) and another is Hunter (which includes identifying creatures by trails and spoor and also bringing down creatures from ambush or with traps and snares) and another is Dungeoneer (which includes stuff that in D&D would be climbing, swimming, squeezing through gaps, and Dwarf-type detection of sloping passages etc). To use the skill system, you need the canonical lists of what each skill lets you do. The system doesn't have a Performance skill - it treats musical instruments as tools that can be used to buff some social skills - but there's no reason in principle why it couldn't - eg Performance can substitute for Manipulator or Persuader but only when you are able to use your instrument. (Whether that would be balanced or not would be a further inquiry.)</blockquote>

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