Level Up (A5E) Question - Expertise and Proficiency

[Sword of Spirit]

I agree there are issues. I suspect the designers thought that giving up to five extra skill proficiencies to a high int wizard was too much, and would step on the bard's toes. The idea of giving specialisations instead meant that the wizard could still be a font of knowledge, but in a more focused, PhD kind of way.

Of course, with the rule in place, they needed to account for the possibility of characters without any knowledge skill proficiencies. And that is where the strangeness arose.

You know, I suppose an alternate option that also avoids giving free skills, is to just entirely remove the option to take a skill, and then leave the other options flexible. So anyone can use it for a combination of specialties, languages, and tools, but nobody gets a new skill out of it.

 

[Praeden]

You know, I suppose an alternate option that also avoids giving free skills, is to just entirely remove the option to take a skill, and then leave the other options flexible. So anyone can use it for a combination of specialties, languages, and tools, but nobody gets a new skill out of it.

That seems like a simple and eminently sensible solution.

 

[Faolyn]

You know, I suppose an alternate option that also avoids giving free skills, is to just entirely remove the option to take a skill, and then leave the other options flexible. So anyone can use it for a combination of specialties, languages, and tools, but nobody gets a new skill out of it.

I like this a lot.

 

[Legendweaver]

Would it really be a problem to give an academic class like a wizard several of knowledge skills? Kinda seems like a feature to me! And the bard's still gonna beat the wizard handily at perception, athletics, acrobatics, stealth...And on

It's true skill proficiencies are more valuable than specialties or tool proficiencies - but what about a rewording that allows anyone to gain a skill proficiency for twice the cost:
During character creation, you gain a number of proficiency points equal to your Intelligence modifier (minimum 0). You can spend these points as follows:

• Spend two proficiency points to gain proficiency in one of the following skills (covered in detail page 408): Arcana, Culture, Engineering, History, Nature, Religion
• Spend one proficiency point to gain a skill specialty in one of the following skills (covered in detail page 408): Arcana, Culture, Engineering, History, Nature, Religion.
• Spend one proficiency point to choose an extra language known or pick a tool proficiency in one artisan’s tool, gaming kit, instrument, or vehicle.
  
  

 

[niklinna]

I'm just worried about making room for multiple specialties on my character sheet!

 

[Faolyn]

Actually, another question is, can we double-up on the specializations and get levels of expertise, like a wizard who takes Arcana (the planes, 1d6 Xdie). That would make more sense than having two get two different specializations.

 

[niklinna]

During character creation, for each point of your Intelligence modifier above 0 you can choose a skill specialty in one of the following skills (covered in detail page 408): Arcana, Culture, Engineering, History, Nature, Religion. If you are not proficient in any of these skills you can gain proficiency with one, choose an extra language known, or pick a tool proficiency in one artisan’s tool, gaming kit, instrument, or vehicle.

Bold emphasis is mine.

Note that as worded ("one of the following skills"), you have to put all of your specialties into one skill—which is silly, of course. I filed a bug about it. It should be "any of the following skills".

When I read the second sentence, I understand it to mean that the alternatives to a bonus speciality are only available to characters who have none of the listed skills. Furthermore, you are not limited to taking only one speciality per skill, and indeed many characters (including your warlock) must use a high int bonus to take multiple same skill specialities.

This makes sense to me.

A High Elf wizard will get Culture from their... culture. They may perhaps have no other knowledge skill proficiencies, but in that case the fact that they have Culture means that they are obliged to spend all of their bonus int to take specialities in Culture. They would probably be better off having a few other knowledge skills to spread the bonus specialisations around.

[...]

Morrus agreed with my reading of the rules on the other thread, although we haven't heard from the person who actually wrote that section.

Well, you're going to get skill proficiencies from your class, too, which counts as "during character creation", right? And a wizard who doesn't take some knowledge skills at that stage is going to be...a rather particular build.

 

[Praeden]

Well, you're going to get skill proficiencies from your class, too, which counts as "during character creation", right? And a wizard who doesn't take some knowledge skills at that stage is going to be...a rather particular build.

It's certainly unusual. But I was only using it to illustrate how the system works according to RAW. There has been quite a bit of misunderstanding over this matter, spread over two threads.

 

[noodohs]

So uh, I know this is an old thread, but was there every any consensus on this? It doesn't appear to have ever been changed and I'm now working on a high-INT character who only has, from the lore skills, nature proficiency. And as a result, they are going to have to take FOUR specializations in nature. Which just seems ridiculous to me.

Edit: j/k, looks like the web tools has both the old version and a new list of options that hasn't been put into the PDF yet, or at least not the one I have. At some point, they'll probably want to remove the old rule. Having said that, I'm still at a bit of a loss. Can I get a specialty in a skill I'm not proficient in? I don't really want extra artisan's tools or gaming kits or vehicles and there's only so many languages and nature specialties I can care about.

 

[W'rkncacnter]

Edit: j/k, looks like the web tools has both the old version and a new list of options that hasn't been put into the PDF yet, or at least not the one I have. At some point, they'll probably want to remove the old rule.

oh wow, yeah, they did fix it. they uh...should probably mention that on the errata page, if absolutely nothing else.

Having said that, I'm still at a bit of a loss. Can I get a specialty in a skill I'm not proficient in?

nothing says you can't, so you can.