D&D 5E Required Class Skills

[SkidAce]

Every example seems to have learned what Arcana would teach

He may know how to produce an effect, but not know why it works.

 

[SkidAce]

Arcana
Your Intelligence (Arcana) check measures your ability to recall lore about spells, magic items, eldritch symbols, magical traditions, the planes of existence, and the inhabitants of those planes.

Lore, knowledge, and history, like the other knowledge skills.

Although many tie it to the mechanics/science of spellcasting (as do I in some cases) it is not necessarily so.

Wizard may not have bothered studying about the planes or their inhabitants. Or other magical traditions.

They merely learned to spellcast.* Heck it says "recall lore"....maybe they are the absent minded genius.



*now don't get me wrong, I feel there is some bleedover, but its not required.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

...which immediately limits the backgrounds I can pick...

Are you using a house rule that removes the core basic player-side option to customize backgrounds by choosing *any* two skills and *any* combination of two languages or tool proficiencies (among other things)?

Because that is, by the Basic Rules, as core of a player option as being able to choose a human fighter. There’s no problem with a DM house ruling any of those options away, but they need to realize they are removing an option that is considered to be more core than the ranger class itself.

 

[Xeviat]

Are you using a house rule that removes the core basic player-side option to customize backgrounds by choosing *any* two skills and *any* combination of two languages or tool proficiencies (among other things)?

Because that is, by the Basic Rules, as core of a player option as being able to choose a human fighter. There’s no problem with a DM house ruling any of those options away, but they need to realize they are removing an option that is considered to be more core than the ranger class itself.

I mean that if I'm making a ranger to play for myself, I feel like my five skill choices are preset for me (though I acknowledge that that is partially me wanting Athletics and Nature, which aren't necessarily "needed", though I do want a proficient Int skill to gain part of the advantage of Favored Terrain). Thus, no matter what I build my background as, it's going to have to include two of those five skills, which limits me.

Whereas, looking at the fighter, I'd only feel like athletics was necessary, so my skill and background choices feel wide open. It is just an observation of the Ranger class, and I wonder how much of that contributes to any of the common dissatisfaction of the ranger by the community.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

Ah got it; a choice of any two skills is still only two skills. I only brought it up because it seems like a lot of people miss that option of the game and I have this strange compulsion to make people aware of all the available options (unless I'm dealing with brand new players--I'd rather have them play a pregen to start).

 

[Fanaelialae]

Every example seems to have learned what Arcana would teach

If that's how you feel you can swap Arcana for a different background skill. If I disagree I can not swap. Win win.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I just skimmed all the classes, and aside from the rogue's Hide function of cunning action, no class other than the ranger gets class abilities that utilize a particular skill. Plenty of subclasses do, but not the basic classes. This is really interesting to me.

It seems to me that, unless you want to "punish" lack of system mastery, you'd give a class with an ability that directly built on a skill that skill, up front, and if a sub-class had such an ability, make the skill in question a preq or perk of the subclass...

...But I don't feel like 5e design was nearly that exacting.

 

[Fanaelialae]

It seems to me that, unless you want to "punish" lack of system mastery, you'd give a class with an ability that directly built on a skill that skill, up front, and if a sub-class had such an ability, make the skill in question a preq or perk of the subclass...

...But I don't feel like 5e design was nearly that exacting.

I could see granting the skill as part of the feature that builds off it. I don't see any reason to grant it a level 1 though.

 

[Fanaelialae]

Every example seems to have learned what Arcana would teach

Arcana =/= spellcasting. Otherwise I could pick up Arcana for my fighter and cast wizard spells.

It's the difference between theoretical knowledge and practical understanding. In RW terms, the difference between understanding a concept in physics and performing a rote experiment that demonstrates that concept of. There are far fewer of the former than the latter.

Many wizards will be capable of both. They will have studied a wide range of magical effects and be able to identify them. That's Arcana; theoretical knowledge. By virtue of the fact that the PHB does not require wizards to have this knowledge, it is not required for spellcasting. This is not limited to 5e. BECMI, 2e, and 3.x all had skill systems that did not demand a wizard take Arcana/Spellcraft/[other equivalent skill].

The first example could have learned Arcana. It depends on whether his war mage mentor approached studies from a more theoretical or applied direction. I'm of the opinion that his non-traditional mentorship earns him the benefit of the doubt.

The second would be unlikely to have Arcana. The urchin is specifically called out as not understanding the theoretical underpinnings of what he is doing. That says to me that he isn't proficient in Arcana at all.

The last example is certainly not proficient. His past life is. But unless they're on speaking terms, that doesn't help the farmer. Just because he has an intuitive understanding of how to memorize and cast a spell doesn't mean he understands what he is doing in the least. Such lack of understanding could well play a role in his past life's plan to take over.

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

As hard as you're trying to be "right on the internet", nobody in this thread is confused about the DnD mechanical implementation of proficiency.

No, but there is definitely some confusion in the context that you were using it, and you opinion as to what the D&D mechanical implementation represents.
I think that is why Blue was pointing out the mechanical difference in D&D between being proficient in something and being good at it. - To try to resolve the confusion and work out in what context you were using the word.

We're trying to discuss what it would even mean for someone to devote their life to being a math professor, being good at it, and somehow never becoming skilled at math. As others have rightly pointed out, it's a bit nonsensical.

No, unless there is confusion about what a wizard actually is. They use rote spells involving specific verbal incantations, gestures etc to create effects. That sounds more like a technician to me. The only part of the wizard class that would appear to show specific knowledge is the ability to come up with new spells every level. Given that spells are only one part of what Arcana covers, this does not seem conclusive that all wizards are trained in Arcana, rather than other options.
The arcana experts? The "math professors"? That sounds to me more like a sage rogue with expertise in Arcana. - All that time the wizards were practicing the exact intonations etc required to cast spells, the sage was learning more about planar geography, dragons etc. He knows the theory behind how spells work, but lacks the practical training to actually cast them.

That's the premise of this entire thread, in fact, so I can't discern what sets you off against my comments in particular. If you don't like the idea of inherent class features, you may as well get angry that wizards have predefined numbers of spell slots and complain that it holds you back from playing a very specific, suboptimal, theorycrafted wizard you dreamed up that you feel has more flavor than the wizard-as-described in DnD lore.

No inherent class feature of the wizard keys off Arcana proficiency as far as I'm aware. There also seems to be a little confusion around a D&D wizard vs one specific stereotype of the D&D wizard.