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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Kaisoku" data-source="post: 4447085" data-attributes="member: 58447">There are two mechanics for the skill system that I tend to dislike.I really, really, really don't like the mechanic of "each skill point gives you one more of the following list". Perform and the current Speak Language both do this, and it's a mechanic that irks me.I know it's done to simplify a corner case of the game that most people would gloss over anyways... but it just feels weird to have a person that's really REALLY good a piano, be JUST as good at 20 other instruments as well...I can understand having some basic knowledge of music allowing quicker learning or even some aptitude for other instruments... but an Epic piano player should not automatically be an Epic violinist or cello or vocalist, etc.The second mechanic I dislike is broadening a skill that thematically shouldn't require it. Meaning.. opening up Speak Language to be like Knowledge or Craft... you just don't need a 23 grade differentiation between fluency of a single language.Perform could be made into how Knowledge works, being better and better at a specific instrument/style, etc. But speaking or writing a language is fairly binary after a certain point. Either you know the language well, or you are learning it... there's not enough distinction after that in real life, let alone required for a game like D&D to warrant it.So Languages become this corner case that I've always had to just basically gloss over.Probably the best way to handle it is to make it separate from the skill system, at least once you are fluent in it. Meaning... you don't use Speak Language to "know" a list of languages. If you know the language, be done with it.Speak Language would instead be used to try to converse when you DON'T know the language. Meaning, those scholarly people that can try to converse with people by picking apart things they might recognize in body language and build from similar languages.Actually knowing a language could have a different mechanic for learning, possibly just running a Complex Skill Check over the course of time, using the Speak Language skill (useable untrained, etc). Someone with a decent Int score could possibly eventually learn a language from exposure, without needing to dump skillpoints into it.That makes Languages more campaign oriented, and something done over the course of the character's life... rather than just something you toss some points into.And you'd still have the skill for the Polyglot characters that like to have the tongue of babel (or whatever). Spoony bards...* Edit *Checking Perform again, it works like the Knowledge skill since 3.5e. Still hate that kind of mechanic though, and it appears that Speak Language is the only one that still works like that.</blockquote>

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