For you.
I think we have little further basis for discussion here. The game you want to play is not a game I would want to play; I find a game limited to killing things and taking its stuff unsatisfying.
Stop the lying. That is not I you said and you know it.
What is the game you want to play if it does not involve solving some amorphous problem that will involve figuring things out, going places, killing monsters, and/or taking their stuff.
What part of political intrigue requires that you be able to play an instrument or make an axe?
A: None, it has to be specifically ham strung into the campaign by your DM.
1) The DM need not drive it. The profession and craft skills players pick often relate directly to their self realized actions during the game. A character who fancies himself a fletcher will make replacement arrows during the game; a character who has craft(poison) obviously intends to make use of the skill.
Why? This is useless to the game. The game is not rolling to determine whether or not you make arrows and how many you make, that is ridiculous and pointless. You say you can make arrows and you make arrows because its financially inconsequential. Who cares except you? If you are the only one that cares, why does it need to be defined? Just say you make arrows and you make some arrows. Is your DM so anal that he needs to track the 10 GP you are going to save over the course of an adventure where you will gain hundreds of thousands of GP in wealth?
Same with craft(poison). Unless you are looking at getting something for "nothing". [which was already covered by the "just wants to break the game" stipulation that has already been mentioned, specifically with poison you are gaining combat actions which is even more of a problem.]
2) It need not be ridiculous at all. PCs don't exist in a vacuum. The reason for the PCs involvement in the game may be directly informed by the skill, or vice versa. Is it really ridiculous for a character to make use of profession(sailor) during a seafaring game? Or mining skill in a game in which the character is a miner whose co-workers unearth something better left burried. I find your supposition of how these skills are invoked to be at odds with the facts.
Yes i find it ridiculous that a character would make use of the "profession(sailor)" skill during a sea faring game. Because during a seafaring game i would be expecting everyone would be a sailor and how good they were at doing the things that sailors do would be defined by the rest of your skills! No one is going to be sitting around determining how much money they get per week based on their skill, its pointless. Anything else is just abusing synergy bonuses[remember that thing about gaming the system?]
No one needs the sailor profession, you've got an entire set of skills right there that determine how good you are as a sailor,
use them.
3) If you are trying to shame me for designing a game to address what players are actually interested in (as evidenced by choices made in character design), you'll have to try harder, because it's a valid and compelling technique.
Nope[also, please stop misrepresenting my position], i am trying to tell you that the design choice that requires said skills is stupid and bad. You can perfectly well address the interests of your characters and their backgrounds without these skills. But there is never, ever a need to roll die for a profession check. There is never, ever, a need to roll a die for a craft check. There is no difference between the DM making a situation where you can use your craft skill and the DM making a situation where you can take advantage of the long lost cousin in your background. In both instances the DM is going out of his way to make the situation conform to your background. In no instances do these situations ever come up in the normal progress of DnD.
Such, if you have the option of "bringing in your background by specific intent of the DM" and "bringing in your background by specific intent of the DM" the option that doesn't involve making your character worse at everything else for no good reason is the ideal mechanical design choice to make for your game.
Do you need to save the world? I'm not talking about a musician class here (though there is de facto one in the core in 1e/2e/3e, BID), or a crafter class or what have you? This is a skill, a minor resource of a character, something that is generally safe to allocate a few points to even accepting that you aren't going to have a critical use for it every game.
That said, are there not other challenges on the road? Can the characters not, for example, find it important to impress the emperor of a foreign nation in order to win his support? That's the stuff good stories and good gaming is made of AFAIAC.
These impressions are not achieved by achieving some random quaternary task that cannot be achieved in the same manner by simply using a different set of skills and then describing it as saying you did it by quaternary task. Its achieved by ANY task that the player so deems. Because of such, what the background is is immaterial, its pointless to be there, use your other skills to define how well you perform the action that you can do because of your background.
E.G. you want to impress an emperor. You want to do it by playing a song, you want to do this because you said you play the lute. Well, you play the lute and now you have a skill challenge regarding your dexterity for finger placement, endurance or athletics for stamina, acrobatics or athletics for flourishes of various sorts, and insight to determine what he wants.
You are making a sword and you can do the same thing. The end result is that you get to use your background in a way to advance the plot just fine. But you don't need the skill to achieve the task, and the skills provided will actually do a better job of describing the action and defining the quality of the end result than a roll of a perform or craft skill will.
Maybe you need to get into a room, but the door is locked. Well you're a blacksmith. So you fool around with the lock and say that you want to craft a key. Well, its your perception or thievery roll that would let you know how to make the key. Boom you make the key, just as if you had picked the lock, though it probably too a bit longer.
Maybe you need to climb a cliff? Well, instead of climbing you want to make some stairs, it will take more time, but you were a carpenter and you're in the forest so you've got wood. Its endurance to get the work done, dungeoneering to make sure the planks are in the right space and wont fall out. History or Nature to select the right wood. Boom, now you've got a skill challenge the entire gang can take part in[someone has to find and collect the wood] and you can make your staircase.
Maybe you need to navigate a channel? History, Perception, Athletics, Nature
Maybe you need to forge the mythical metal into a mytical sword? Athletics, Endurance, Arcana, Religion, Perception. A group without a smith would have to go find one of the proper caliber, which would be whole other skill challenge.
Maybe you need to go down a cliff, but you're a weaver and want to make a parachute? Arcana, History, Perception, Streetwise.
etc etc etc
You don't need these skills.
