Search, Spot, Listen

[nittanytbone]

Surprise rounds in 3.5 are already pretty painless, even for those ambushed.

Giving everyone free access to Spot/Listen just makes stealth skills much less effective.

Warriors who desire to be skilled at detecting ambushes should either multiclass (Ranger and Barbarian are both full BAB classes with spot/listen in their class skill lists), take a weak feat (Alertness), or sink some skill ranks cross-class.

 

[MachinaDeus]

Spot and Listen are class skills for all player classes IMC. My reasoning is that adventurers that aren't good at seeing/hearing what's about to kill them don't tend to stay adventurers for very long. That being said, I also give bonuses based on character level to both spot and listen, depending on class.

 

[ChampionoftheTriad]

I have been on the fence about this sort of thing for quite awhile. However, I am about to launch a HEAVILY house ruled campaign, and have a couple of ideas:

First, I was going to have the "+2 to 2 skills" feats grant those skills as class skills for all of your classes...but while reading this thread, I realized that that may be too much...it dilutes the classes that are good at stuff...mind you, I am giving extra class skills and A LOT of skill points anyway...so I feel I must take a step back. I will give a progressive bonus for those feats, as many have mentioned elswhere on these boards.

Now too the main point...sorry...I ramble a bit...I am going to give ALL classes a competence bonus of +1 per 4 character levels in all UNTRAINED skills. Naturally this won't stack with other competence bonuses. This will give the high level adventurers a leg to stand on with those skills they've used a million times, but don't spend their resources honing. This would still allow the skill monkey to shine, but reflect the vast EXPERIENCE of high level characters.

 

[Jhulae]

I love the way True20 puts Spot and Listen (as well as Touch, Taste, and Smell) into one skill, Notice.

It makes so much more sense. Um... no pun intended.