D&D 5E Required Class Skills

[BlivetWidget]

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.

Copying spell scrolls is the only feature that explicitly relies on it. Other than that, it's just expectations.

You've hit the nail on the head that it comes down to disagreement over what the wizard is. But the original post is about 5e, and I feel like 5e is fairly clear. A few bits about the wizard class from the phb without copying too much:
"the expertise attained after years of apprenticeship and countless hours of study..."
"Scholars of the Arcane..."
"As a student of arcane magic..."
"you learn your wizard spells through dedicated study and memorization..."
"the arcane research you conduct on your own, as well as intellectual breakthroughs you have had about the nature of the multiverse."

And from xge: "Wizardry requires understanding. The knowledge of how and why magic works."


That all pretty clearly reads like Arcana to me.

 

[Blue]

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. 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.

No, "we" are explicitly not trying to discuss the math professor. Some posters are trying to shrink the argument to just that.

What we are talking about all charactgers who take the wizard class, since that's what a change to the class would affect. The studious professor of magic (who has proficiency in Arcana) is one but also the young wizard who's self-taught and is still figuring it out (don't have arcana yet), the wind-wizard sailor who has had the tradition passed down to them because they were the bright cabin boy who could understand the words and gestures but it's actually against character for them to have a wide and deep knowledge of other magic, runes, and everything else that's in the Arcana skill. And many more. The conversation is not about just the bookish wizard, it's about all the archetypes. And many of them either need not, or should not have the Arcana skill.

Please, stop trying to pretend that there is only one type of wizard. There are a wide variety of concepts that can take the wizard class.

 

[BluejayJunior]

Hide in Plain Sight gives a +10 to a single stealth check. That means that even a nonskilled ranger can still be pretty darn stealthy. As long as they aren't moving. It is entirely possible to not be skilled at moving stealthily, but know enough to be able to spend a minute to make camouflage sufficient enough to hide a nonmoving person.
Vanish also gives you the ability to not be tracked by nonmagical means. That part feels more like survival than stealth to me. A ranger could totally not be very stealthy, but be in tune with nature and tracking enough to be able to not leave a trail.
I see where you are coming from. But I think that forcing certain skills just makes classes more one dimensional and limits some of the creativity of coming up with character concepts. Blue has had some great ideas for wizards that wouldn't have proficiency in Arcana.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Please, stop trying to pretend that there is only one type of wizard. There are a wide variety of concepts that can take the wizard class.

While I don't disagree that a wizard could learn magic & have his spell book while remaining ignorant of Arcane lore outside the practical necessities of his trade, I can't agree that opens up a wide variety. The wizard is a bookish, Vancian/Hermetic magic-user, no matter how you tweak or polish it. Casting arcane spells without all that training and that spellbook was broken out to the innate-magic Sorcerer and the pact-fueled Warlock (and, without the spellbook - ie oral tradition, I guess, to the Bard).

D&D has gone from one Magic-User class, to 4 fully-supported full classes - plus two new sub-classes in two formerly all-martial-all-the-time classes. They were bound to get a little narrow.

I could see granting the skill as part of the feature that builds off it.

As long as there's language that gives you back the choice if you /did/ already take that skill, sure.

I don't see any reason to grant it a level 1 though.

No compelling reason, no. Anyone who's v-tude might be tweaked by 'suddenly' getting both the skill & enhancement /could/ just plan ahead a little and take the skill earlier.

 

[maceochaid]

I mean we could have these debates about so many things in the rules. For instance I feel that Thieve's Cant should be part of the Criminal Background not the Rogue Class, and I'm tempted to even say that Druidic should be an option of the Acolyte (Choose Celestial, Druidic, or another language that is important to your religion). Then also add some specific wording to languages, maybe a list of languages you can only learn if your background states you can, or you use downtime to learn and have a specific teacher. Obviously, like everything, up to DM fiat.

Point being I can see a lot more reasoning in "All Wizards must have a fundamental understanding of Arcana since they are theoretical casters (with Warlocks, Bards, Wizard Spell List usingArchetypes, and Sorcerers representing amateur, dilletantes, and other concepts)." Than I can see "all Rogues know the secret code of thieves." However ultimately this is just a place where we can disagree.

 

[Garthanos]

How about recommended I mean trust your players to be thematic and give them an extra if you want

 

[Horwath]

Ranger's starting skill proficiency should be:

Nature, Perception, Stealth and Survival. Period.

Without that skill set a ranger is not a ranger.

If any of those skills are taken with Race/background, ranger can take equal number of other class skills at character creation

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

Ranger's starting skill proficiency should be:

Nature, Perception, Stealth and Survival. Period.

Without that skill set a ranger is not a ranger.

Well darn. I'll be sure to tell them.

 

[Fanaelialae]

Ranger's starting skill proficiency should be:

Nature, Perception, Stealth and Survival. Period.

Without that skill set a ranger is not a ranger.

If any of those skills are taken with Race/background, ranger can take equal number of other class skills at character creation

What about Athletics? Hard to imagine a ranger who can't climb a tree or swim across a river.

What about Animal Handling? Calming a spooked horse seems like it should in their wheelhouse.

Include these skills on the "required" list and the ranger player doesn't get to make any choices regarding skills whatsoever. That makes each ranger a cookie-cutter character wrt skills. Which is rather boring IMO.

I think allowing players freedom of creativity is more important than making sure they are doing it "right". I realize that many DMs/designers have the impetus to say, "you're doing it wrong, give it here". However, the PC is the one piece of the game world the belongs to the player. As such, the player's vision regarding their character takes precedence over the DM's, IMO. Maybe the player wants to be less Aragorn and more a military scout. In that case, a different skill may take priority over Nature, and it's not our place as DMs to tell those players that they are doing it "wrong".

Most of the times, players will choose the skills you listed, or a very similar set. IME, players will play to type much more often than against. That said, I'm still of the opinion that they should have the freedom to choose themselves, rather than the DM making those choices for them.

 

[Horwath]

What about Athletics? Hard to imagine a ranger who can't climb a tree or swim across a river.

What about Animal Handling? Calming a spooked horse seems like it should in their wheelhouse.

Include these skills on the "required" list and the ranger player doesn't get to make any choices regarding skills whatsoever. That makes each ranger a cookie-cutter character wrt skills. Which is rather boring IMO.

I think allowing players freedom of creativity is more important than making sure they are doing it "right". I realize that many DMs/designers have the impetus to say, "you're doing it wrong, give it here". However, the PC is the one piece of the game world the belongs to the player. As such, the player's vision regarding their character takes precedence over the DM's, IMO. Maybe the player wants to be less Aragorn and more a military scout. In that case, a different skill may take priority over Nature, and it's not our place as DMs to tell those players that they are doing it "wrong".

Most of the times, players will choose the skills you listed, or a very similar set. IME, players will play to type much more often than against. That said, I'm still of the opinion that they should have the freedom to choose themselves, rather than the DM making those choices for them.

You can still have more skills with race/background.

Elf; starts with perception, so that frees up one skill to choose from Athletics, animal handling, acrobatics, medicine.
Half elf; gives 2 skills to pick free also,
variant human; one skill,

background give 2 fixed skills or one(maybe two) that overlaps with suggested 4 fixed skills so it also give one or two skills free to pick or two fixed in background that complement rangers abilities.